


Needfire

by Areola



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, F/M, Plot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-07
Updated: 2020-10-07
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:42:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 38
Words: 187,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26868352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Areola/pseuds/Areola
Summary: Hermione and Snape watch their lives spiral out of control as the battle with Voldemort looms.
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger/Severus Snape
Comments: 12
Kudos: 49





	1. First Act

**Author's Note:**

> Author's Note: Welcome to Needfire by Bicycle Built For Two, a collaboration of authors Areola and Melisande88. The point of view of Hermione Granger -- the odd-numbered chapters -- is written by Areola. The point of view of Severus Snape -- the even-numbered chapters -- is written by Melisande88. You can reach Areola at hatchepsut@gmail.com and Melisande through her.
> 
> This is a completed work.
> 
> A word of caution before you proceed, gentle readers. This story is rated NC-17 for a number of reasons, among them adult themes, explicit sexual content and descriptions of abuse. For the bulk of the relationship between Snape and Hermione, Hermione is still in school. If these topics squick you, please do not proceed. You have been warned.
> 
> And now, without further ado, we proudly and happily bring you... Needfire.
> 
> \--Areola and Melisande88
> 
> Disclaimer: We own nothing you recognize. It all belongs to JKR.

"I am the biggest hypocrite  
I've been undeniably jealous.  
I have been loud and pretentious  
I have been utterly threatened.  
  
I have abused my power forgive me.  
You mean we actually are all one...?  
  
...Always looked good on paper,  
sounded good in theory."  
  
\-- One. Alanis Morissette.  
  
  
He was rather ugly. No- ugly was not the word, she decided now as she watched the Potions Master move through the classroom. Though his harsh, aquiline features could not, under the best circumstances, be described as handsome, Hermione thought there was indeed something appealing about the man. Perhaps compelling was more to the point. That pale face seemed to palm your stare and hold it until you were left breathless. No, ugly was definitely not the word. He was...unclean. Greasy. Conceited. Corrupt in some way that made it legitimate to think of him corrupting her.  
  
A vision of her Potions Master had wavered on the underside of her eyelids while Ron had been kneading her left breast. Snape had been gazing at her, or so it seemed to be, with a look of contempt. She'd blinked, frowning, trying to focus her senses on the exact spot where Ron's fingers were stroking her flesh. Regrettably, her breasts had never been very sensitive and while Ron did enjoy playing with them, she could only stare at the ceiling, gathering lost thoughts like scattered butterfly-shaped pins.  
  
Perhaps that was the thing with Snape. He seemed to be so fucked up himself that he probably wouldn't dare to suggest something was wrong with her own workings. Hermione imagined he _would_ make some nasty comments, but not as to hint her body wasn't functioning properly. Donna, she supposed, would be secretly overjoyed to discover such insecurities in her daughter. The petite, never-to-be-caught-without-her-make-up Donna, seemed to take Hermione's confidence in her sexuality - as well as her daughter's disinterest in her appearance - as a personal insult to herself.  
  
She did wonder what Donna would have to say if she saw her daughter brooding over a teacher that was twice her age. Mummy- as Donna insisted she would be called, would probably be appalled.  
  
What would Donna say if she could see into Hermione's mind, see her daughter's strange obsessive dreams? Hermione imagined a rose-coloured lipstick-smile, dropping from her mother's perfectly made-up face when she saw Hermione sprawled naked on the sturdy desk of the Potions classroom. Hermione would have had her robe tossed aside previously; the folds of her school-uniform skirt pooling around her naked, spread thighs. Her knickers would be twisted around one shin; simple, lollypop coloured satin against the cream white of her skin. A perfect composition leading the observer's eye straight into her soft, moistened center.  
  
Then there was Snape. She wasn't exactly sure where she'd put him: unsure whether she wanted him to touch her, _yet_. Whether she was ready to be soiled. Maybe to have him looking at her was the worst of all - to have him contemplating her as a piece of meat, pursing his lips in his fastidious sneer, his quill brushing his cheek; his jaw-line; caressing his thin, cruel mouth. That quill- maybe it would be trailing down her body, along her spread, milky thighs, making its way towards her pulsing clitoris with sharp, accurate strokes. Later, standing in front of the mirror in the prefects bathroom, she'd be able to see the words 'I'm a silly Gryffindor Know-It-All' blemishing her pure, white skin.  
  
"Miss Granger!"  
  
Snape's scathing, deep baritone stirred her out of her short reverie and yanked her back into the advanced Potions class.  
  
Hermione blinked.  
  
"You are not paying attention!"  
  
Composing her face into an expressionless mask of bourgeois kindness, Hermione shot her apologies. The poor bastard really didn't have a clue. Perhaps she should introduce him to Donna: "Mummy, please meet Professor Snape, an ex-Death Eater, master of the Hogwarts' dungeons and an avid fan of kinky toys." But in an afterthought- no, Snape didn't seem to be the kind to use whips or handcuffs in his bed: no foolish wand waving indeed. Only hands, blue-white, graceful, competent hands - so pale you could almost see the veins interlacing, in bluish, mysterious roses under his skin. Like the skin of a baby's forearms.  
  
It had been in July, during the summer of her sixth year in Hogwarts, that she woke up in the middle of the night, after having an erotic dream. Her dream, she remembered, had involved the greasy bastard of a Potions Master and herself in some compromising position. A light, summery breeze had entered Hermione's room, carrying the sickeningly sweet scent of jasmine from the garden. Between her legs, sheâ€™d been wet and dripping.  
  
Strange, detailed, uncomfortable dreams. Not unlike the ones she had been experiencing at seven and ten years old, where her younger self was recumbent on the nylon-blue dentist's chair in her parent's clinic, tweed skirt lifted to expose her gelatinous, pink-purple vulva.  
  
Donna, with her cellophane smugness, said masturbation was all right. It didn't feel all right to the girl on the dentist's chair. It felt twisted and wrong, Hermione remembered, and she didn't know why it should make her crave this way. Nevertheless, it did, and she was fascinated by the dichotomy of cool, monochromic vinyl against her own small sobs of pleasure.  
  
She remembered lying in her bed, at eight or so, contemplating whether the monster that had lived in the closet when she was younger might still sneak out if she let her guard slip. A couple of hours later, when she still couldn't fall asleep after already going to the loo once, she had found herself caught in the intricate web of strange noises echoing about the house. Her mother's voice was drifting, moving down the hall like fluid, shadowy fingers and pouring into Hermione's room. Donna - mummy - had been angry. The realization had made Hermione listen attentively as her mother was hardly ever angry. "It's always you she's looking up to," Donna accused, failing to keep her emotions locked behind her beautifully painted mask of cosmetics preparations.  
  
Her mother, or so it seemed, had blamed her father for taking Hermione away from her. Privately, though, the child had presumed that it was hardly a wonder that she preferred Lester. That is, with Donna always trying to stuff her into some smart dress which would rearrange her insides: to make her into something she was not. Donna's own Barbie doll to dress up and play with.  
  
Hermione supposed it was one of the reasons she had never been very fond of girls. That and what she viewed as Donna's selfish, treacherous nature - Donna, who perceived her own daughter as a rival. Girls, Hermione thought, were cold-blooded and manipulative, always striving towards their own ends out of some petty motive: their shiny, silvery fish-scales, hidden behind lipstick, high-pitched giggles and sweet perfumes. A demeanor designed to ensnare the senses and prevent a clear view of their true nature. Men, however - for the most part - were simple and uncomplicated. Being a female, Hermione had never aspired to understand them completely, but sheâ€™d been satisfied knowing that with men she felt much more comfortable. Hence, she preferred the company of boys to that of girls.  
  
Hermione's father, as opposed to her mother, aspired for perfection - it had been his daughter's academic achievements of which he was most proud. While other fathers showed off pictures of their children, Lester Granger preferred to tell about his infant child's latest intellectual endeavor. He was a pedantic, rather fastidious man, who enjoyed good wine, a well-argued research paper as much a well-written suspense novel; he was a keen yet critical follower of mechanical innovation made for dentistry and his opinion was highly regarded amongst his colleagues. Tall and trim at forty-eight, with some grey hair accenting his deep hazelnut mane, Lester Granger was a handsome man. At the age of four, Hermione had wanted to marry him.  
  
Frowning, she shook away the memory. It seemed pointless and insipid, stretching backward as the passing minutes slipped away.  
  
The rest of the day passed uneventfully. Ron and Harry had a Quidditch practice, which meant several hours of undisturbed reading. Luckily, with the title of Head Girl - gained fair and square in her seventh year - Hermione was also bestowed with her own room. Always being a relatively introverted person, she had indulged in her new privacy. Now, lounging on her bed, the pillows settled to support her back, she carefully sweetened her tea (which she brewed exactly to the temperature she preferred), then retrieved Kant's 'Doctrine of the Faculties'. Gathering her knees to her body, she spread it against her thighs, and careful not to wrinkle the paper, opened the book to the page where she'd left it last night.  
  
Kant was clear and thematic. In a sense, reading him helped Hermione put some order in her scattered thoughts. When her tea was finally consumed, leaving a thin coat of sugar at the base of her mug, she bookmarked the page she was currently reading and set the book aside. Careful as ever, she adjusted it until its angle on the low table was pleasingly precise.  
  
Unfolding the training mattress, she began with a sequence of Yoga positions. Twenty minutes later, she was twisting and looping her body to its full flexibility, each time arranging her body in the 'baby' position before she sleekly slid into the next position.  
  
Ron, his red hair wet and a drenched towel hanging from his shoulder, found Hermione lying on her abdomen. Her hands were stretched backwards, fingers wrapped around her ankles, swaying a little backward and forward.  
  
"Hello, Hermione! That's really...impressive!"  
  
She let go slowly, moving into the baby position before rising to meet him. "Hi Ron, what's up?"  
  
"Practice is finished," he informed her, smiling boyishly. "And since I was done with my charms homework earlier than I thought, and there's no DA this evening..."  
  
She replied with a forced smile. This week was busy for both of them, with two DA meetings; the trio's own private training sessions; extra homework assignments and Ronâ€™s intensive Quidditch practices for the upcoming Gryffindor-Hufflepuff match. Having her own homework to complete, Hermione knew it would be a stressed, annoying encounter for her; she'd be too busy thinking of her duties, unable to concentrate and enjoy the sex. Nevertheless, after she had refused Ron over the weekend, Hermione also knew that if she wanted to maintain her status with her boyfriend, she had to compromise a little.  
  
Smiling at Ron, she leaned to kiss him, allowing his tongue into her mouth. Ron always tasted like Sugarquills; she really liked kissing him. But then there was this nasty assignment Snape gave them today. Snape, running his dark quill along his thinly pursed lips when he graded those papers that always seemed to pile on his desk. In her dreams, the desk's oaken surface smelled of semen and bertholine: the way the devil summons his crowd.  
  
Amm-mm... sloppy, slobbery, wet noises of a kiss...Ron was cupping her breasts. All too gently, as if asking for her permission. She wanted to scream. They were analyzing the alchemical qualities of dragon blood in class - Snape wanted the damned essay by Friday. Inhaling, Hermione pushed Ron to the bed, kneeling between his parted legs. He only made a small noise of protest when she reached for his zipper, saying something about wanting to spend time with her.  
  
Closing her lips around Ron's cock, Hermione found herself reciting the twelve uses of dragon blood. She had found it helped her ignore her gag reflex; 'you should allow your larynx to massage it' Ginny explained to her once. _Massage it_ , Hermione thought, _or simply attempt to swallow the organ you've so carelessly sucked in_.

* * *

Calculated as ever, Hermione ushered the still wrapped-up-in-orgasmic-bliss Ron out of her room; the salty taste of his cum lingering in her mouth. Brewing herself another tea, she washed away the bitter remnants and then headed to the library, where she'd write her essay for Potions class.  
  
That night, turning and rolling under her quilt, Hermione dreamed of Donna. Her mother was standing in the middle of the Potions classroom, dressed in a nylon-blue designer suit. Her face had been carefully made up to look younger and more attractive. Her lips, this time with Clinique's deep bourdeaux-wine, were turned up in a weak, unsure smile - as if she was waiting to be ordered around. She looked foolish and pathetic, and in some disturbing way, erotic, as her impersonation of self-assurance was slowly cracking to reveal the easy prey she was.  
  
With that realization fertilizing the rich, dense setting of the scene, Professor Snape swept into the classroom, his black robes billowing around him. A predator. He circled Donna once, measuring her with his dark, cat-like eyes, then, without uttering a single word, approached her. They were standing face-to-face now; the relatively tall Donna on her elegant, stiletto heels, and the yet-much-taller Severus Snape. He put his hand on her shoulders; brutally and emotionlessly pushing her down on her knees.  
  
Donna's big, brown eyes were wide with both fear and arousal. Her hands shaking, she fumbled with the mass of Snape's robes - pure, lucid white, against opaque, superstitious black. Several seconds passed before Donna finally pulled Snape's thick, already dripping cock out of its restrictions. She had stopped for a moment to drink in the sight of the beautifully sculpted male organ. Snape was less patient. With one, crude motion he shoved his pulsing cock in between Donna's partly opened lips. He smirked as she choked in reaction, her eyes brimming with tears. Some of Donna's bourdeaux-coloured lipstick was smeared on the veiny, reddened skin of his cock. The colour had been diluted by Donna's saliva as Snape withdrew a little, only to thrust back inside, burying himself to the hilt.  
  
Lying in her bed in her Head Girl's room, Hermione was sound asleep. A thin film of sweat was covering her face; her fingers digging into the linens in search of some lost orgasm. A few minutes later, dream Snape spilt his seed into dream Donna's mouth, and on her lips, sleeping Hermione could taste a man's seminal fluid.


	2. Ritual Cleansing

_seeker of truth  
  
follow no path  
all paths lead where  
  
truth is here  
  
\-- e.e.cummings_  
  
  
  
Severus Snape. Potions Master. Legilimens. Professor. Death Eater. Greasy git. Great bat. Bastard. Spy. Soldier.  
  
All words for the same entity. Names for the body, the accomplishments, the skills. Not names for his soul.  
  
He **had** no name for his soul. He was not certain he **had** a soul. But he was in search of it. And to that end, he had fasted for an entire week, drinking only bitter herbal tisanes to help in the cleansing, the emptying, of his flesh.  
  
He had spent the night in the Potions Dungeon, the closest thing he knew to a sacred place in this Castle. Sacred only to him; no one else cared to spend much time there unless they were forced to.  
  
He had cleared a space in the geographic center of the room, sending aside the heavy lab tables and stools and ingredient cupboards. He had carefully cleaned the floor of his sacred space, using abrasives on the granite, swabbing with moist white cloths until the dark floor shone.  
  
Instead of sleeping, on the stroke of midnight he carefully positioned himself according to the compass points, on his belly, on the cold floor, naked: head to the East, arms outstretched with palms down to North and South, legs close together, feet to the West. His head rested at an awkward angle, the point of his chin on the floor so that he was looking forward, into the flame of his fat white candle, the only light in the room. It was large to burn through the remaining hours of the night. After he had saluted the points of the compass, he drew himself into a seated position, legs crossed vaguely half-lotus, as much as his resisting body would permit.  
  
It was cold and dry, as always in the Dungeon. His meager body heat made the barest of inroads against the chill of the stone floor. He was hungry. And later, he became thirsty. His muscles ached from holding one position. His head was splitting. His body cramped more than once, and eventually, the full-body cramping became acute, became expected, became welcome, became warmth.  
  
Much later, after the hours spent contemplating the leaf-shaped flame of his candle, he felt freer, lighter, hollow.  
  
Ready to be filled.  
  
By what, he was unsure. There had been no teacher, no guide, for many years, and so he was searching, learning, striving alone. Filled by a waiting soul, perhaps.

**~*~**

A little more than an hour before dawn, Snape got stiffly to his feet and stretched slowly, waiting for his muscles to relinquish their aches, at least enough for him to bathe and clothe himself. It would be quite some time before he was comfortable again. When he could move without grimacing in pain, he stepped towards a shallow bowl he had set on one of the lab tables. Next to the bowl were a number of items necessary to his ritual, and his druid's clothing: a folded length of cloth, a pair of leather sandals, a robe, a rope, and a druid's cloak made of fine mesh and row upon row of palest, smallest, down-feathers.  
  
Snape unstoppered an earthenware flask, glazed outside to retain the liquid inside, and poured a gill of sacred oak water into the bowl.  
  
 _Hands, my works._ He dipped both of his long hands into the bowl, one at a time. He allowed them to drip back into the bowl for many moments. _Cleansed._  
  
 _Head, my thoughts._ Cupping a small amount of the water, he poured it over the top of his head. Small rivulets drained down his face and neck. _Cleansed._  
  
 _Heart, my will._ Another small cupping, poured over his chest. _Cleansed._  
  
 _Mouth, my words._ Snape drank the water remaining in the bowl; it was never to be wasted, nor poured uselessly on fallow soil. It tasted of stone and earth and a certain greenness, astringent with tannin. _Cleansed._  
  
He lifted the long white lambs' wool cloth in his hands. Passing one end between his legs and drawing it up snugly to his body, he began the carefully prescribed wrapping, folding and tucking of the loincloth around his lean hips, a fabric origami. It was never to be secured in place by anything other than itself. _Clothed._  
  
Snape bound the sandals to his feet, wrapping their long bleached thongs up his legs to just below his knees, and securing with the same careful twisting knots as the loincloth. _Clothed._  
  
He dressed in the white woolen robe, belting it with the rope, secured with the same twisting knot. _Clothed._  
  
And last, Snape swung the feathered cape over his shoulders, waiting for it to settle like the almost-live thing it was. It still had wings of a sort. It warmed him weightlessly. It had belonged to his mentor, Angharad, and had come to Snape by obscure routes when the old woman died. He spared a moment to examine again the fine mesh, and the thousands of buff sparrow, owl and cuckoo feathers that were interwoven there. Prey sparrow, predator owl, and prankster cuckoo. _Clothed._  
  
He lifted his small golden sickle to his mouth and kissed it, held it to his forehead, eyes closed for a moment, then held it to his heart. He hung it on his rope belt by its thong and wooden netsuke*, carved in the image of an acorn of oak. _Prepared._  
  
He threaded a smaller cloth through the rope, next to the sickle. _Prepared._  
  
Though it galled him to do it, Snape covered his whiteness with the blackness of his Hogwarts teaching robe. It would not do to draw attention to himself in white.  
  
Snape left the dungeons, exiting a little-used Castle door to avoid detection, and headed for the edge of the Forbidden Forest, to a certain oak tree he had selected weeks ago, one that was perfect for his purpose and near his ultimate destination, the Standing Stones. His aquiline face lifted to the sky; in the vestiges of the night, a faint sprinkling of stars remained, like salt on dark velvet. The moon was setting slowly in the west, sitting fatly on the horizon. He had chosen this day carefully to have the presence of both sun and moon in the sky at dawn.  
  
At his first opportunity, once his path had taken him out of the general view of the Castle windows, Snape removed his teaching robes and carried them in a bundle over his arm. It felt good, it felt clean, to be out in the frosty pre-dawn chill in his Druid's clothing. The breeze blew away any trace of the Dungeon funk from the feathered cloak and white woolen robe. His feet were cold, but then, his feet had been cold all night; this was not particularly different, except for the soaking dew at the hem of the white robe and in the footbeds of his sandals.  
  
The great oak was nearly two miles southeast of the Castle. It would have been so much simpler to mount a broom and coast quickly those few miles, but his mentor had taught him differently. By the time he reached the oak, he was beginning to limber. The walk had done his abused muscles good, filling them with warm blood, stretching them. Snape looked up to see the dark clumps of mistletoe high in the tree, where it fed on the oak sap and bore its poisonous white berries and fleshy leaves. He unfolded his teaching robe and spread it fully on the ground. Then, he followed with the feathered cloak, carefully laid upon the teaching robes to protect it from the frosty dew. And finally he removed the belt and white robe. He needed to be free to climb, to reach the mistletoe.  
  
It would have been so much simpler to summon down a clump of the parasitic plant, but his mentor had clearly taught him differently. Looping the rope around his waist now, Snape noticed the rasp of its fibers against the tender skin of his belly. He threaded the netsuke and thong through the belt, so that the sickle would be ready to hand when the time came to reap the mistletoe. The smaller white cloth he tucked there as well. Snape moved to the oak, pressed a benison to the rough bark with a pass of his long pale fingers, and began to climb.  
  
It took some time to reach the clump, but as he neared it, he sought a secure foothold and a place to lean his body; he would need both hands for the next task. His long arms reached with the sickle and carefully cut away the clump. He made a pouch of the smaller square of white cloth, and tucked the clump inside. The sickle was returned to his belt; the four corners of the pouch he placed between his teeth for safekeeping as he returned to the ground.  
  
Snape garbed himself again, and folded his black teaching robe; he carried it over his arm. In one of its deep pockets were the dried leaves of sweet bay and fragrant splinters of cedar that he would burn with the mistletoe at dawn. He set his face to the east, and began walking quickly. The sky was greying now, blushing towards apricot; all but a few persistent and bright stars had gone, and he must be at the Circle near dawn. It wasn't far to walk. The feathered cloak lifted behind him, though it clung enough to warm his shoulders. It wanted to fly, but it must billow instead.  
  
Snape was just barely in time, with the sun peeping above the horizon but not yet shafting its rays towards the Stones. He removed the incense bay and cedar from the pocket of his teaching robe and left the robe behind. He set foot on the avenue of standing stones that led east to the Circle itself. Breathing quickly, he strode towards the Circle. As he walked, he heard the cuckoo's low, soft call heralding his arrival: Snape, the Shining One, had come, here at last to celebrate the sunrise and the moonset. Sparrows accompanied him, flitting from stone to stone along the avenue, chirping as sparrows will. In the last of the night, a ghostly barn owl swept silently above him, banked sharply to the north at the edge of the Circle, and was gone. With its passing, the sparrows silenced.  
  
A red dawn was beginning. The moon was almost down; just the thinnest edge of her silver remained.  
  
Snape entered the Circle. Though he knew there were thirteen Stones in the Circle, local legend still stated that no one had ever accurately counted the Stones. While one's back was turned, they moved. At night, legend said they went down to the stream to drink. If one were to find a Stone slaking its thirst, one might be granted the heart's dearest wish. The Stones danced at the full moon, and sang at the new. At such times, one could feel the rushing of power, leaping from stone to stone to stone, creating a ring of energy so strong that someone within the Circle could not pass through until the energy subsided.  
  
Snape knew the Stones did none of these things, not any longer. He wanted to restore the fullness of their power, renew the energy that should flow along the stone avenue and concentrate in the Circle itself. Then, perhaps, the legends would be true again, the Druids would have power again, and Snape...well, then Snape would teach a new kind of student. But without a guide and mentor, he had to feel his way, discover for himself what was to be done. It was difficult, and something was still not right in his method of celebration. The Needfire would not come when he called for it. He wondered what was missing. It was the reason for the elaborate purification, purge, and meditation he had undergone this past week. Something within himself was not right; he was impure, that was why the ritual failed each time.  
  
He approached the altar stone, the square one, used in many ages past for burned offerings. These days, the only traces of offerings were the scorch marks remaining from his own equinoctial celebrations or other special days, or, as there was this morning, trash left behind by the vile picnicking Hogsmeaders. Snape growled and wandlessly swept the Circle of all the scraps his black eyes could see, and piled them outside in a heap, to be incinerated after his ritual. Damned irreverence, that's what it was. They had not been taught the respect due a holy place. He would ward this place again before he left. His last wards had worn thin, that was why there was so much debris. He would make the desecrators sting and cry for their trespass, catch them like flies in his own stony little web.  
  
As he stooped to place his offerings on the stone, ahead of him to the east there was the quarter of a red eye--the sun, rising. Long, dark shadows leaped into life around him, shooting past him across the flat place where the Stones stood. The Stones were powerful, bloody with the dawn's virgin light; symbols of the phallus, brutally and clearly masculine in their intent and jut. If only they were awake, he thought longingly.  
  
Snape turned to face the west, and the moon, slipping out of sight now. That last rim of silver crimsoned, then vanished. He bowed his head and spoke quietly. "Arianrhod, sweet rest."  
  
Back to the east then, to usher in the dawn.  
  
"Bel," he spoke, baritone throbbing with strength. "Welcome." He laid the white cloth with the mistletoe on the altar and aligned its corners precisely with the compass. He was not sure the alignment was necessary, but it felt right to him. He placed the sweet bay and cedar on the cloth as well.  
  
He straightened, removing the sickle from his belt. He set its inner curve to the pad of his thumb, and drew it across his skin, scoring, drawing blood.  
  
"East, into the bright Light." A single drop of blood into the mistletoe.  
  
"West, into the soft Night." Another drop.  
  
"South, into the warm Spark." A third.  
  
"North, into the chill Dark." And the last.  
  
Snape put his thumb to his mouth to lick away any further blood; it would not do to taint the offering, and his own life force should not be wasted or dripped uselessly on fallow soil.  
  
He took a wide stance, lifted his head to the sky, and called for the Needfire. Every other time he had resorted to using his magic to burn the offering, but he always tried the call first.  
  
This time was no different, even after the fasting, the pain, the night spent on the chill floor of his Dungeon. He had not varied from what he remembered of the ceremony from years past with his mentor, other than his cleansing. Something was still not right.  
  
He bowed his head, miserably disappointed, and lit the offering with his magic. " _Incendio._ "  
  
When he looked down at the stone, thin trails of smoke were rising. The cuckoo called, once and sharply.  
  
Severus Snape fell to his knees. He felt the strengthening rays of the sun shafting through him. His body felt clear, like glass, but he knew the void that was Snape would not be filled, not this day.  
  
When the last of the offering had burned to ash and blown away in the rising morning breeze from the south, Snape left the circle the way he had come. He paused in the avenue long enough to ward the Circle afresh, a stinging hex to cause discomfort and pressure and make the visitor disinclined to linger. He incinerated the pile of trash he had swept from the Circle. Then he dressed himself in his teaching robes and began the trek back to Hogwarts.  
  
Druid Snape was shaken.  
  
He was exhausted.  
  
He was hungry, and he had a lab to put back in place before the first class at nine.  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: This is not your mother's Wiccan ritual, this is Druid Snape's own, created especially for him. Thank you in advance for not flaming to correct us. :-)
> 
> Netsuke: Japanese. A tiny, exquisitely elaborate carving used with a cord as a toggle to secure an article through the obi, or kimono sash.
> 
> You can visit here for a general idea of what Hogwarts' stone circle might look like (hint: it's not Stonehenge): http://www.scotland-info.co.uk/c-nish.htm
> 
> You can visit here for a general idea of what Snape's sickle looks like, though the handle of his sickle is considerably shorter, to allow it to be slung at a belt.  
> http://gardenshoponline.com/prune/noborigamasickle.html
> 
> Sources: The Golden Bough -- Sir James Frazer  
> Mysterious Britain -- Janet and Colin Bord  
> Complete Poems 1913 -- 1962 -- e.e. cummings


	3. White

"You from New-York you are so relevant  
you reduce me to cosmic tears  
luminous more so than most anyone  
unapologetically alive knot in my stomach  
and lump in my throat."  
  
\-- So Pure. Alanis Morissette.  
  
  
The cold pre-dawn air slashed Hermione's lungs in one clear stroke, reminding her once again to inhale through her nose. She rebuked herself, concentrating, and sprang onward. Each jolting step sent a reviving impact through her body, ascending from the soles of her feet. In contrast with the beat of her heart, the beat of the jogging strummed on joints and muscles reawoken to life.  
  
Around her, morning creatures were slowly crawling out of their burrows, while the night was carefully and thoroughly shutting down. Night's animals were retreating back into their hiding places as golden slivers were creeping unto the sky like octopus arms and sucking away the purplish darkness. Sweet dew was crusting the grass, spraying on Hermione's Nike-clad feet as she trampled the lush, green stems. A curious bee watched her over the top of a daisy, and then moved along lazily to the next flower.  
  
She was about a mile from Hogwarts. The castle kept twinkling in the distance like a faraway star that refused to sink into the sea together with the moon. Its protective wards were still sizzling around her: a stable, firm wall of white magic. Two years earlier, she had asked for Dumbledore's permission to use the castle grounds for training. The Headmaster agreed, as long as she remained within sight of the castle, making sure Hermione knew how to produce alert sparks in case she needed someone to come to her aid. Hermione, who, in the end, was much less adventurous and far more calculated and accustomed to certain luxuries than she liked to admit, found herself discovering large parts of Hogwarts and its grounds which she never knew before. The Standing Stones, which she was heading for now - about a mile and a half from the castle - was one of those locations.  
  
Their long, uneven shadows were floating on the grass, and could be seen long before the Stones themselves were discerned against the hazy mixture of colours that was the pre-dawn sky. Above her, Iris was pedantically mopping the darkness out of the blackish heavens. The Stones in the distance were gathering the sun's first rays. They were drinking them in; glowing with strange, mysterious light. _Breathing_.  
  
Dawn, Hermione discovered after visiting the site several times in alternating hours, was the only time of day when the Stones almost appeared white in colour. But not completely. Dusk, as well, was a strange time to visit the Stones, when once again the sun cast incredibly long shadows onto the ground, drawing the light away. At dusk, the Stones were almost fearsome - a scattered array of ancient monuments incarnated out of the shadows; poisoned arrowheads shot toward blank, ominous sky.  
  
She remembered that evening all too well. The Stones had been panting around her, launching ropes of sizzling magic as if to trap the foolish fly of a girl who got caught amongst them. A thin film of sweat had misted on her limbs, gluing her clothes to her body, and she cried: a sharp, loud cry of fear. Someone, she was sure, had been watching her from the shadows. No answer had come. She must have been paranoid. Crazy to be afraid of the Stones this way. She'd read about them after all- they held no Dark Magic, no danger for her, as powerful as they were, and powerful they were indeed.  
  
It was all this damn pressure, Hermione attempted to assure herself, just the damn pressure that made her breath shorten, the pressure of studying for the NEWTs, while knowing the final battle was probably to be expected at the end of the year, that plagued her with all those disgusting dreams about Professor Snape… Oh God, oh God, she must think… Reaching for her index finger, Hermione stretched the digit until she heard the silent, sickening sound of unbuckling. She then repeated the process with the rest of her fingers, until she felt calm enough to move forward. Taking a calming breath, she planted one leg in front of the other, and began to move, away from the Stones- and back to the castle. Where she would have the large, luxurious prefects' bathroom all to herself.  
  
In Hogwarts, just the way she did upon waking from the dream in which she'd seen her mother sucking off Professor Snape, Hermione scraped herself back to sanity. It'd been years since she'd felt the urge to do so, and the teen sobbed as she literally scratched the soap into her skin. She felt dirty: sweaty, unclean and impure, betrayed by her own mind. Hermione knew she was probably causing herself damage, but she couldn't help but force herself under the scalding water; hissing as the nearly sizzling liquid burnt her skin back to cleanness.  
  
As a young child, she had entertained several symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorder - Hermione would never have stepped on the lines notching the walkway; she always placed her slippers with their noses even and turned to the opposite direction of the bed. There were certain drawers she had to open and close two or four times before she could reach for their contents and her hands would always be impeccably clean. None of it would have ever occurred to her mother until, while trimming her daughter's nails, she'd suddenly noticed how red and sore her eight-year-old girl's hands seemed to be.  
  
With that began an endless cycle of experts, most of them family friends of her professional parents. Donna and Lester Granger had been relatively late to marry and their daughter, Hermione, was treated with the care and reverence reserved for only children.  
  
Natalie, who had been a children's expert highly recommended to her parents, had insisted she was causing herself damage. She had often wondered, though, whether _thing_ about her hands had actually been Donna's way of showing Hermione her place. Being cleverer than Donna ever thought her to be, Hermione had never shared this observation with her therapist, sensing that first and foremost, Natalie sided with Mummy. She therefore had done her best to keep her hands clean without scratching them every hour and a half, and was apparently partly successful in hiding most of her compulsive-obsessive behaviors. Natalie, the traitor, had been of course rewarded for curing the Granger's treasure of her ailments. Hermione Jane Granger, for her part, had learned a lesson about the importance of being discreet. She'd also learned that Donna could hardly be trusted to have her daughter's welfare in mind.  
  
Ever since what she referred to as the 'Natalie incident', Hermione was careful to maintain a detailed diary of her different OC symptoms, keeping every aspect of the disorder under close inspection. She had several breakdowns over the years: incidents when she'd nearly hurt herself before she managed to get the problem under control. The diary, however, was kept in order to enable her to track down patterns and frequency of certain behaviours. What she saw when she checked the entries from the last three weeks was disturbing. She then lifted her palms, inspecting them, and screwed up her face at the sore, red skin. She hadn't even noticed washing them so frequently.  
  
She'd have to figure out a way to get the situation under control, Hermione decided, sinking back to the present. The Yoga and the jogging did wonders to relieve her stress, but the sport wasn't enough. Perhaps a potion was the solution she needed - though it would force her into some serious research concerning psychiatric potions. A branch of magic Hermione wasn't even sure existed - and research she definitely didn't have time to do. She could approach Madam Pomfrey of course, but then, Hermione had very little faith in medical personnel when it concerned her mental health. Perhaps she could have asked Professor Snape, she mused- presented the issue as her recent project for the DA… No, no, Hermione shook her head. It was a bad idea. Over the last few weeks, Professor Snape had become almost a taboo for her. She would leap out her seat and out of the Potions classroom the moment the lesson was over, fighting the urge to scratch every trace of the man off her body. His dirtiness -once arousing; still arousing, in fact - began to haunt her. Ever since the dream, she felt as if wanting him alone made her impure.  
  
Watching the Stones forming long, protruding creases in the sky's canvas, Hermione wondered whether the Professor was some kind of negative mirror she used to look at herself. She didn't fool herself into thinking the man was anything to her but a random number, a variable, that she used to verify certain parts of the complex theorem that was her own psyche. And still, she wondered what his cock tasted like.  
  
She was a nitwit. Supercilious, pretentious, hormonal teenager; driven by her sexual urge rather than by her common sense.  
  
Hogwarts seemed to be suffocating her lately: the stonewalls closing around in a sense that was almost empirical; pumping the air out of her lungs and sending her into an asthmatic heave. And just think how anxious she had been to break free from Donna's clutches this summer! There'd been this guy, Jonah, "you'd love him, darling," who was the "son of our friends, Adelaide and Alfred: she's an oncologist and he's a lawyer," that her mother tried to set her up with.  
  
When Hermione had explained to her that she already had a boyfriend, Donna only gave her another burgundy-coloured smile. "You're so young, love," she chattered. "It's time for you to have some fun before you settle."  
  
"For Christ's sake, Mum!" Hermione had huffed. "Ron and I aren't getting married next Tuesday!"  
  
Donna had smiled, exposing a set of perfectly straightened, china white teeth. "That's exactly what I'm saying, darling. So what are you wearing for dinner? The Huntingtons are coming and I want you to look your best."  
  
Hermione had contemplated coming down to dinner in a tricot shirt and faded jeans, knowing Donna would most probably suffer an apoplexy. At last, not wishing to upset her father, she'd taken a quick shower and put on an Armani dress Lester had brought her from her parents' last vacation in Italy.  
  
It was a beautiful garment, Hermione remembered as she neared the Standing Stones. All clingy silk, the colour of liquid chocolate: skillfully cut, bracing her figure as if it was stitched around her body. Les was a fine shopper, unlike Donna who had an eye for phosphorescent, grating colours, closely fitted; and overall a keen fondness for whatever item that screamed of exaggerated feminization. Fifties style vinyl bags; Hermes' scarves with flowered patterns; sickeningly sweet perfumes and pearl strings - like prayer-beads - gracing her aging neck.  
  
Creamy, unblemished skin, notched by time, kissed by the wind, heated by the sun, bitten by the cold of the rains and the snow. Looking at the ancient Stones, now arising from the grass in front of her, Hermione was reminded of Donna. The stones were ancient, hunched Goddesses wandering in the dewy grass, while Donna was a modern Goddess, of vinyl and kerosene, and would be buried in a coffin: to protect her body - mummified by cosmetic preparations - from the raw earth, and the raw earth, from Donna Granger's sweet, poisonous perfume.  
  
Hermione began to slow her steps, panting, until she stopped completely, at the foot of the center piece. It was a delicate, graceful Stone, thinner and higher than her sisters. Sometimes it reminded Hermione of a heron. Other times it reminded her of an elder, willowy lady - a former ballerina perhaps - with age slowing her movements and inflammation pouring into the once flexible joints. Nonetheless beautiful.  
  
Hermione inhaled deeply, supporting her hands on her knees. Frosty wind was congealing the flimsy coat of sweat that shone on her forehead, sneaking under her clothes to cool off her body. The sun, hardly a quarter of a coin peeking above the hills in the east, was breathing ethereal light on the Stones. Straightening, Hermione unloaded the small satchel on her back, reaching for a small bottle of mineral water. She drank languidly, allowing ribbons of clear liquid to trickle down her chin and into the collar of her jogging fleece, until she slaked her thirst. At that, Hermione glanced at her Muggle wristwatch. Five thirty. Time to turn around and begin the three miles run back to Hogwarts: around the cliff from which the castle towered, across the Quidditch Pitch, around the Great Lake and along the Forbidden Forest's skirts, where she would head back to the castle.  
  
Her muscles now warm and responsive, Hermione quickly set into a moderated, comfortable rhythm. Around her, the air was beginning to warm as well. The high-pitched hooting of bats - circling the high foliage - had been fully replaced with the morning birds' recalcitrant chirping. The sky, Hermione noticed as she neared the Forbidden Forest, was still dark, though ribbons of hazy orange tinted its lucid aqua-marine. The bluish mists drifting from amongst the trees carried the heavy scent of rich, fertile earth the colour of menstrual blood clots.  
  
She jogged lightly, inhaling the smells of the forest. The dewy, envy-green grass that flexed and broke under her feet; the rotting foliage that covered the forest's ground, and the heady, mind blowing perfume of black roses, which grew way back in the depths of the forest. Here, in the open air, it was finally clean; with the chilly autumn wind drying the sweat off her body, slowly untying the tangled knot of anxiety and distress that had been building at the back of her throat for several days. When, at first, she noticed the white-clad figure, Hermione tended to dismiss it as another fog molded vision of the forest. Then the figure moved, disconnecting from the bluish mists, and Hermione was forced to realise it was indeed a human being that she was watching. She had to maintain her pace and be back to the castle within the next twenty minutes or so if she wanted to keep her schedule: there was no time for stalking strangers in the fog, as intriguing as they might be. But then, she was always known for her curiosity; Lester's little puppy, always snooping around his office, concaving into the curves of his large, masculine palm, seeking for warmth and attention.  
  
Decisively, she slowed down, nearing the place where she saw the androgynous figure, all shrouded in white, walk deeper into the forest. As silently as she possibly could, Hermione stepped into the whirling fog and into the forest, moving along the shadows as she discreetly followed the white-clad person. Its attire, she noted, was that of a Druid: a beautiful, lush feather cape that reminded her of an exiled baroness, adorned with luxuries of her once glamorous past, above a plain, white robe. Tall and lean, the person wore the ancient clothes with incredible grace, moving silently through the forest as if it were one of its creatures.  
  
Then she knew who she was looking at.  
  
Well. _Well_. That was rich. Professor Snape in a druid Drag Queen's costume. Out of his coffin to scare history into undoing itself. Damn, she thought, but he looked sexy, no matter what he wore. Wonder if he'd bothered to wash his hair before wrapping himself with all this illuminating, _clean_ whiteness. It was, perhaps, the moment when Hermione's heart metaphorically stopped beating and for the longest second, her desire for the man was not only a series of chemical reactions controlled by her pituitary gland; more than the gaping, libidinal astonishment of a hormonal teenager. It was a fist in the guts, a reaction she could store, following Aristotle's friendly advice, along with her sacred ideals, side by side with the phallic, shiny black Berretta, and her copy of the Bible.  
  
Worrying her lower lip, she considered the best way of following her Professor into the maze he seemed about to enter, her mouth drying when he suddenly halted.  
  
 _Bloody hell, Granger. He's going to turn around and catch you staring at him, but there will be no X-rated detention in his office with you wearing fishnet pantyhose underneath your school uniform and Snape wielding the cane_ \- and fuck fuck fuck, couldn't she just stop thinking with her clit for a moment and be rational? Swallowing, Hermione glued herself to her temporary hideout behind a roughed tree trunk, praying to the Lord this sanitation-white angel of a Snape wouldn't display his usual alertness and detect her presence.  
  
Luckily, although having scanned his surroundings with a mien Hermione could not decipher, Professor Snape was apparently too involved in his own rituals to notice something as insignificant as her. Slowly, ceremonially, he unfolded the thick, black cloth he was carrying, and spread it on the ground. His teaching robe, Hermione noted. Once the garment was lying on the Forbidden Forest's floor, Snape had carefully shed his feathered cape; long, beautiful fingers trailing along the luxurious mesh. His were fingers made to be adorned with diamonds, sapphires and emeralds, she found herself musing longingly; fingers to be painted with henna and kissed by bowing gentlemen. _Baroness Snape_. Who reached those lovely, lovely hands of his to the rope that hung loosely around his waist, and, with one sure pull, untied it. The ripples of white, rough fabric embracing Snape's willowy figure were then removed.  
  
She wasn't sure there was a word to describe what she saw, as somewhere, some part of her kept screaming that Professor Snape in a loincloth was ridiculous and pathetic. Another part urged her to stroke herself through the fabric of her trousers until she came, biting her lips so she would not scream her orgasm out loud. Looking at him - just looking at him without touching herself or hearing Harry or Ron make some nasty comment in her head - was unnerving. Not because the mere sight was unnerving: technically, he was almost everything Hermione had always expected him to be. Too thin; beautifully pale - like fine, superb cream; delicately built, but manly so; ugly- which was nothing new. New was seeing him with the heady perfume of the forest clouding her brain; against the green darkness of the foliage; dressed like the ancients: it was the image, not only the man, which made her knees suddenly weak - again - and made her suddenly thirsty.  
  
 _Think, think, she had to think…!_ But instead, she watched Professor Snape. The Potions Master lifted his face, searching the tree's foliage, eyes moving along the thick mess of leaves until his gaze rested on a darker lump that was, unmistakably, mistletoe.  
  
 _Ten points to Gryffindor_ , she thought angrily. _You really are pathetic Granger, now aren't you?_ Too foggy brained to notice Professor Snape was standing in front of an oak. _Of course he's after mistletoe, dressed like that_ , she preached to herself. _I really wonder how much more there is to it_ …In front of her, Snape was approaching the tree. With an elegant move indicating of practice, he closed his right hand around a bulky ridge in the wood, and clinging to the trunk, began pulling himself upward. A muscle up his back shrunk, making Hermione moisten her lips. _I could skip meditation and go to the library after I'm showered, she thought frantically, if only classes didn't start at eight…Good gracious!_ Looking at her wristwatch, she realized it was already 5:30. High time for her to be back in the castle, showered and meditating. She shouldn't have let herself be carried away. About time she should be going anyway- as long Snape was busy gathering the damn plant. Why didn't the pompous prick just use his wand to retrieve it anyway?  
  
She made herself scarce, her patience somewhat frail. As much as she tried to be discreet, Hermione could still hear the dry leaves crackling under her feet. Frustrated, she swore under her breath.  
  
Once in the castle, alone in the prefects' huge bathroom, she tore off her clothes, disgusted to note the signs of arousal staining her pants. _Unclean_. He made her unclean and disgusting. Unreasonably exhausted, feeling childish and stupid and immature, Hermione burst into tears. She told herself it wasn't rational: there was no reason she should suddenly find her body fluids dirty. It had been years since she held a mirror in front of her spread legs and stared at herself with revulsion. Years since her genitalia was "it" and was an area she touched with curiosity mixed with repugnance.  
  
And yet, she was angrily soaping her vagina and vulva, washing it with vengeance again and again. Only when she closed her legs - the numbing kiss of pain compelling her to tighten her lips - did Hermione know she was finally clean.

* * *

More than an hour later, after having awkwardly attempted to cover the puffiness of her eyes with makeup, Hermione sat at the Gryffindor table, stuffing food to her belly and for once, glad that her boyfriend was so thick. Ron, whose hand was draped over her shoulder, was having an animated discussion with Harry about some new curse his best friend wanted to teach the DA on the next meeting. The last one, Hermione had fleetingly remembered, Harry was late to by almost half an hour.  
  
Every once in a while, Ron would turn to heap some more food onto her plate, ask her to back his current argument in whatever debate he and Harry were having, then return to Harry, telling him Hermione was saying that he, Ron, was right, while Harry was wrong. Well, he did ask her if everything was all right when she stepped into the hall, all jumpy and nervous, but was all too happy to beat a retreat when she pushed him off.  
  
Sour-faced, she sipped from her pumpkin juice, and then removed some of the oily food Ron piled onto her plate. No matter how much time she spent on explanations, Ronald Weasley was still sure 'nutritional' equaled 'a calorie bomb'. Sometimes, Hermione thought, remembering the last dental floss she'd given Ron, which had become a fishing string, she really wondered why she was even bothering. She knew Ron was trying to stick to the diet she had drawn out in her training program, but sometimes he still made her feel as if for him, it all was some sort of intricate war game.  
  
"You know," she'd told him once, lying in his arms, "on the day the war is over, I'd like to walk in Hogsmeade's main street with my breasts bared, just like young woman who greeted the allies' troops who marched into the conquered Paris."  
  
At first, Ron hadn't said a thing. It'd had been a lovely summer night, meant to be spent outdoors: they'd spent it making love on a blanket Ron spread on the bank of the small lake, about half a mile from the Burrow. Afterwards, they'd lain curled in each other's arms, the water's sweet, insipid smell carried upon the warmth wind. For a moment, she'd thought he understood; that her deep craving for peace, to finally have this madness behind her was something that lived in him as well and that he could identify with - even if not fully rationalize her wish to walk bare-breasted in the wizarding town's main street. But then Ron had shifted uncomfortably underneath her, faintly clearing his throat. "Well, don't you think it would be a little, err… daring? Oh, I get it!" he said, then burst into laughter. "It's a joke! You made a joke Mio- sorry, Hermione! Why, that was cool! Harry will laugh his arse off when I tell him about it. Sure, you go do it gal! It would be brilliant!"  
  
"Oh, just shut up!" she'd groaned. "You can be such a dolt sometimes!"  
  
"What?" Ron had teased her. "You aren't trying to tell me you meant it, right? Hermione? Sweetheart?" He'd poked her shoulder with the tip of his finger in this manner that always made her want to slap him. "Hermione, love, please answer me…"  
  
"Don't sweetheart me and don't poke me like that, Ronald Weasley."  
  
"Look, Hermione, if you want to go naked into the Ministry once You-Know-Who is defeated; it's fine with me, okay? I'm sorry that I laughed. I love you and don't care what you do as long as you're happy about it."  
  
Hermione had breathed deeply, suddenly feeling very petty and immature. So he hadn't understood her wish to act in a certain fashion. So what? He still loved her and supported her. There was only so much she could have; no way she could eat the cake and yet keep it whole. "Okay," she'd mumbled. "But don't do it again. I wouldn't have told you such thing unless I was serious."  
  
"All right. I suppose I should've known. Do you forgive me?"  
  
"I do. Ron- I'm sorry for being angry."  
  
"It's okay. I know my woman."  
  
"I'm not your woman," she'd mumbled sleepily, curling her fingers in the fine, reddish hair that covered his chest.  
  
"Sure you are. Now sleep."  
  
And she'd slept, snug in his arms, where dreams about her sarcastic Professor could not reach her. Nevertheless, there was nothing to prevent the memory of those dreams to reach her now. Nothing that prevented her from replaying the scene in the forest again and again in her mind. Prelude, of a sort, Hermione decided only seconds later, to the Potions Master's sweeping into the hall and taking his seat at the high table. Snape, as was to be expected, was embalmed in his usual, forbidding exoskeleton, and was glaring meaningfully at his plate. Strands of raven-coloured hair fell to contrast with the sallow whiteness of his skin, reminding Hermione of the creature she'd seen in the forest. _Baroness Snape_. The robes, she reflected now, were a bulb of wafer-thin, silken black threads meant as shelter, enfolding Baroness Snape's white, delicate wings and protecting them from the frost and the rain.  
  
For once, he didn't seem to care about the noisy student body, but precisely and thoroughly fed himself. It was, she thought, as if he hardly minded taste and texture, and was merely eating to keep his body functioning. Not that she'd ever remembered Snape doing otherwise. Not that she'd ever inspected Snape's eating habits.  
  
"Are you looking at the greasy git, Hermione?" Ron asked her, shaking her from her short reverie.  
  
"It's Professor Snape, Ron," she told him tiredly. "You better remember that, seeing we have advanced Potions today."  
  
"Yeah, as if he'd call Snape a 'greasy git' to his face," Harry sniggered. "He'd be too busy scrubbing caldrons till the end of the year to beat me in squats!"  
  
"We took measures after a Quidditch practice! All you had to do was to fly around doing nothing for three hours!" Ron protested. "Try it when we're both fresh, then we'll see!"  
  
Harry, never one to refuse a dare, stuck out his chin. "Want to make it a bet?"  
  
Hermione rolled her eyes. "I really have no idea how you two made it into advanced Potions. You behave like two baboons fighting for the Alpha male position."  
  
"For the Alpha male- what?" Ron echoed.  
  
"Never mind, Ron. Harry Potter, please eat with your mouth shut. Boys, we'll be late for class if you don't begin to chew on your bacon sometime soon."  
  
"Yes Mum!" Harry and Ron called together.  
  
And with that, Hermione sipped the remnants of her pumpkin juice and turned to check the contents of her schoolbag for the last time.


	4. Return to Life

_in heavenly realms of hellas dwelt  
two very different sons of zeus:  
one, handsome strong and born to dare  
a fighter to his eyelashes--  
the other,cunning, ugly lame;  
but as you'll shortly comprehend  
a marvelous artificer  
  
\--  
  
next, our illustrious scientist  
petitions the celestial host  
to scrutinize his handiwork:  
they(summoned by that savage yell  
from shining realms of regions dark)  
laugh long at Beautiful and Brave  
\--wildly who rage, vainly who strive;  
and being finally released  
flee one another like the pest  
  
\-- e.e.cummings_  
  
  
  
After returning to his quarters and carefully putting away his Druid's clothing, Snape hurried to the Great Hall. Breakfast first, before he returned to the Dungeon to set the lab to rights. His body was shaking; after a week of only herbal teas, he was ravenous and needed to fuel the fire inside.  
  
The noise of the Great Hall could not reach him this morning, not sheltered as he was, enclosed in the crystalline silence that remained still a part of him after the ritual was complete. He had the barest perception of the room full of giggling, wriggling students, and took his accustomed place towards the end of the head table. It was good to be at peace; even though the ritual had failed yet again, there was still that feeling of centeredness, lightness. He was sure the first class of the day would shatter it, however. The dunderheads would reach through his shield with their voices, their idiotic errors, their questions.  
  
But in the meantime: food. He looked about him; no porridge immediately to hand, and yet he could not envision taking anything else into his body at this time. The idea of protein -- eggs, greasy bacon, kippers -- made his guts churn. He pushed the plates away from him, and then thought he saw what he wanted, midway down the table.  
  
"Minerva, is that porridge down there by Flitwick?" His first words since the ritual. They felt odd in his mouth; the first crack in the crystal. He cleared his throat.  
  
"Yes." With a flick of her wand, she sent the bowl his way, and followed it with the honey pot and a small pitcher of cream, knowing his preferences after years of breakfasts together. "Good morning, Severus. You're a bit late this morning. We haven't seen you at table with us for several days. Is everything quite all right?"  
  
"I had things to do," he replied. He hoped she would be satisfied with the brevity of his response; Minerva often wanted to chat with him. He had never understood why; it seemed pointless, unless there was a common problem to solve. On occasion he valued her input, especially when it came to understanding the conflicting lunacies of the Gryffindor student heart. He often had thoughts of one day mentioning to her that while she talked too much, she expressed herself well. Slytherins were much more straightforward in their motivations. Power, pure and simple, via the most effective path available. They never required translation, at least not for Snape.  
  
He spooned the cereal into a bowl, drooled honey over the top, followed with some cream, and then stirred. His mouth was nearly overflowing with saliva, and the first few spoonfuls went down without a single chew, almost without tasting. He was practically gulping his food. He noticed Minerva watching him from the corner of her eyes, and controlled himself. It would not do to appear a gaunt and slavering hound, snapping up his meal as if someone planned to take it from him. Still, he ate quickly, efficiently; and after three cups of hot, lemony black tea, he felt better.  
  
He'd thought he was starving, he'd thought he would want enormous quantities of the house-elves' excellent porridge, but after finishing three-quarters of the quantity he had placed in his bowl, Snape was uncomfortably full. His stomach had shrunk, the result of his long fasting. Best to stop, though he knew he would be hungry again in an hour or so.  
  
He wiped his mouth, pushed back his chair, gulped the last half cup of tea, and left the Hall without speaking.

~*~

_Sanctuary_. His dungeon. He entered; closed and warded the door behind him, then leaned back against it. He was just now beginning to feel the benefits of his breakfast hitting his bloodstream, and didn't look forward to shoving the heavy lab tables about again, even using magic to assist. His hands were still shaking; a week of bottomed-out blood sugar was having an effect.  
  
He had thirty minutes to set the room to rights before the first pack of dunderheads thundered in and destroyed it again. First-years, Gryffindor and Slytherin. The most miserable combination imaginable. On the one hand, the manipulative Slytherins, trolling for knowledge and advantage in their sly way. And on the other, the reckless, relentless cheer and bravery of the Gryffindors, not quite as intelligent as the Slytherins, but more motivated to succeed. The match, and the flash-powder. Followed by the explosion, every single time. He was bloody sick of Dumbledore rigging his schedule this way every year. It would be much better to mix Ravenclaw and Slytherin, and Hufflepuff with Gryffindor. That way he would have to deal with only one wedge of the emotional spectrum at a time.  
  
This year the chief antagonists were a Slytherin girl, Anitra Skullcap, and a Gryffindor boy, Simon Peach. Each the leader of their respective petty clique and faction. Snape was tired of them. Tired of their nonsense. Tired of their squabbles. Tired of having them both in detentions week after week. Tired of grading feet upon feet of pointless essays that deterred them not at all from further nonsense and mutual House-baiting. Something had to be done, and he thought he knew what, and he thought he would solve the problem, once and for all, today. To that end, he would brew a potion of his own during class.  
  
At some point, his lovely bell jar of silence had departed. Probably at the moment he had considered the level of effort required to ready the room, he thought. A vague sensation of peacefulness still lingered inside him, but for the most part it had been supplanted by aggravation.  
  
He sighed, and began to send the lab tables back into place, destroying his small temple, wishing he could allow it to remain and fill something of the hole inside him. So much effort, for naught. No Needfire summoned, no access to a sort of religious ecstasy, no kindling of the energy at the stones. Nothing, except this small peace, soothing and perfect in its way, but insufficient. He longed for his mentor, but Angharad was long dead.

~*~

At nine the students filed in, mostly silent. He had broken them early of their chatty little habits. Still, at the back of the line, out in the hallway, there was a bit of a scuffle and someone's books were knocked out of their arms. Snape pinched the bridge of his nose, his back to his students. _Shaping up well for a headache-maker_ , he thought. And then of course there was his afternoon, Advanced Potions with that perennial favorite, the leaders of the DA, Potter, Granger, and Weasley. It could only be Monday. His stomach rumbled and he compressed his lips. A week of fasting followed by a high-fiber meal, and of course there would be repercussions. He would just remain at the front of the class today, that's all. If things got too audible he would cast a silencing charm on himself.  
  
He began speaking with his back to the class; exceptionally rude, he knew, and if Minerva had seen him she'd have had something to say about it. Still -- he would not be guided by her ghostly presence in his brain, not today, though on other days he might welcome it. _Minerva, my conscience; get the hell out._  
  
"This morning we will study the properties of angelica. Then you will be making a simple cough remedy. When complete, you will test it on each other. Correct potions will be given to Madame Pomfrey for her infirmary stores, so allow me to suggest you mix it well."  
  
At last he turned, and of course caught Miss Skullcap and Mr. Peach glaring at one another, wands drawn.  
  
" _Expelliarmus_ ," he said crossly, catching the wands as they flew to him. "Miss Skullcap, Mr. Peach, you will wait after class. What have I told you both about foolish wand waving in my dungeon?"  
  
"There will be no foolish wand waving," said Peach, a whining edge in his tone. Skullcap, Slytherin that she was, merely looked back at Snape with considering eyes. He was her head of House; she knew where the limits were, and had not crossed them quite yet.  
  
"Mmm, yes. See that you abide by it from now on. Two points from Gryffindor for attitude and baiting a fellow student." To the rest of the class, he said, "The rest of you can stop staring -- to your potions." He moved to his personal lab table and began to brew his own concoction, the one that would cause the two pests to hear each other's every thought for a week, as long as their wands were within a few inches of them, which was most of the time for a Hogwarts student. When it was ready, he moved to the front of his lab table, where his robes would shield his cauldron from student view, and submerged the two wands of the troublemakers. He let them soak for the prescribed two minutes, then fished them out with a pair of tongs and let them dry out of sight behind the cauldron.  
  
At the end of class, he returned the wands to their owners. "You will each write me three feet on the proper use of angelica in medical potions," he said. Snape watched the immediate confusion that came over the two students; obviously, they were hearing each other's thoughts. He turned his back to hide his smirk. "Dismissed."

~*~

Snape fared better at luncheon than he had at breakfast. He was already ravenous again, but this time felt he could tolerate protein and eat without gobbling. Therefore he chose a selection of cheeses, flat bread, a few thin slices of breast of chicken, and crackers to go with the fruit he always ate -- pears and apples. The food was full of flavor, something he did not typically notice. Food was necessary fuel to the body, nothing more; but he found himself lingering over an aromatic chunk of Stilton on a water cracker. There was a richness about the odor on this day. He attributed it to his still-lingering calmness. It seemed a week of fasting had done him good, body and mind. The increase in his level of awareness was interesting to him. Something to consider for future uses, even though it had not improved the results of his ritual.  
  
"How was your morning?" asked Minerva. "I see that Gryffindor is short a few points already today."  
  
"Peach and Skullcap," he growled. "Kindly speak to him. I will address this animosity with her personally. Teaching is difficult enough, without that sort of disruption every day. From first years, no less. Just imagine what would grow if we leave this unchecked."  
  
"You mean, something on the scale of Malfoy and Potter, Granger and Weasley?" queried Minerva dryly, dipping her spoon into her soup. "It's certainly not reasonable to expect the other students to just ignore the two of them. I'll talk with him. Severus, it might have been more fair to deduct points from both houses."  
  
"Why? That would effectively be the same as giving points to Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw, which they have not earned."  
  
"Both students were likely at fault, knowing the two of them," she said.  
  
"Slytherin is _**my**_ house." This uncompromising statement traditionally ended the familiar argument between them. Minerva knew he would not discuss it further, yet she continued to try to sway his opinion on this front, week in and week out. He understood her sense of fairness, though he did not usually agree with it. It was part of the way her presence in his brain enforced a conscience. She made him think; he supposed that was a good thing, but it was always uncomfortable for him to consider her point of view, because it made him doubt himself. She challenged him. Dumbledore would have said it was good for him to be challenged, Snape thought. Not good for him to have his own way in all things. He wondered if Dumbledore had ever been crossed.  
  
He looked at Minerva now, sitting to his right, grey hair tucked tightly under her pointed hat. Her face looked careworn this noon, but he decided not to ask her about it. He had Advanced Potions to prepare for. Snape thought about her words again, however...Malfoy, Potter, Granger and Weasley. Now, that was an explosive mixture he had conveniently forgotten for a day or so. He felt that as the year drew on into winter, relations between the Slytherin and Gryffindor seventh years would only get worse. There was more and more indication every day that Voldemort was assembling his resources for a final blow. Snape knew he would be busier than ever, treading his tightrope between Dark and Light. He didn't need squabbling students choosing sides on top of everything else.  
  
If only the Needfire had come. Angharad had once explained the nature of the energy of the stone circles and its use in the past for healing, for fertility, for the casting out of spirits. Snape could think of other uses, too. Uses that might enable him to end his double life and dedicate much more time to his Druidic studies, really reach for an epiphany.  
  
He pulled himself back to the here and now, and finished his lunch. Minerva still looked tired, even after eating. He threw Minerva a small, dry bone with the barest shred of meat upon it. "I did give both students punishment essays," he said. She slid him a glance and pursed her lips.  
  
"Very sporting of you, I'm sure, Severus."

~*~

Back in the Dungeon, he waited for his Advanced Potions students to arrive. They filed in, formerly children, nearly adults now.  
  
Draco Malfoy entered the classroom at the front of the line of students, thankfully minus his cortֳ¨ge of thugs, whom Snape had deigned too stupid to continue in Potions study. Snape considered the blond, grey-eyed wizard as he moved to his seat near the front of the class. Young Malfoy was every bit as beautiful as his father, Lucius, and every bit as deviant and hateful. There were three sorts of Slytherin students, Snape had found in his years as Slytherin Head of House.  
  
There were the crafty, eerily bright students, often brilliant in their chosen fields, verging on genius.  
  
There were the thugs, like Crabbe and Goyle and Bulstrode, inbred deviants sorted into Slytherin simply because of their blood purity. They lacked the qualities that would make them fit into any other house. They made excellent foils and pawns for the other two Slytherin types.  
  
And finally, there were the jewels, like Draco: multi-faceted, glittering and exquisite, hard-edged, brutal, capable, stunning in their wicked focus. An admirable adversary, never to be underestimated.  
  
Not far behind Draco was the penultimate Weasley, Ronald. Thank Merlin, only one remained, the single female offspring Ginevra, not as objectionable as the parade of hormonal males. Though Snape had been teaching Weasley for a month already this term, he had not paused to consider the change in the red-head. At seventeen, Weasley had fulfilled the awkward puppy promise of his too-large feet and hands. He towered over his putative siblings, Granger and Potter. His neck was muscular these days, very little smaller than his head: Snape had always considered such appearances to be a mark of stupidity, of single-minded dedication to sport, but in the case of Weasley, this year it appeared to be a new physicality born of intensive training. There was a new, more adult knowledge in the young man's eyes, as well. Snape wondered briefly which female students were aiding Weasley's acquisition of that knowledge and confidence, and made a mental note to extend his nightly hall checks a bit further. Let no chance to deduct points from Gryffindor pass unpursued.  
  
Behind Weasley was Potter. Snape's eyes narrowed. _Potter_. It was hard to look at him without thinking of his father, James, a harsh thorn in Snape's side during his own days as a student at Hogwarts. James, who had found in Snape a target worth baiting at every turn. Snape, unlike Malfoy, had never been a Slytherin jewel. He had been another sort, the tortured genius -- trapped by his own rage and inadequacy, longing for acceptance and finding none -- made bitter and astringent by solitude.  
  
Potter also looked honed, like Weasley. Perhaps the trio was training together, Snape thought. The youth's green eyes were as startling as ever, though; Lily's eyes, eyes that Snape sometimes still saw in his dreams. Potter had not grown much in height over the summer just past -- apparently he would always be smaller, more slender, than Weasley -- but his musculature seemed more defined. Difficult to assess, of course, under Hogwarts student robes, but Potter's hands and wrists were definitely thinner, harder, without the softness of baby fat any longer. These days his lips always seemed to be set in a stern line.  
  
And then the last of the trio, Granger, entering the room with her bookbag slung on two fingers over her shoulder. Whenever the three were to be found together, Granger was always bracketed by her masculine bookends. The smallest of the three, wild-haired, more brilliant than any Gryffindor had a right to be, thought Snape. She should have been a Slytherin, if only there was not the issue of her foolishly devoted heart.  
  
It wasn't often that he considered her, but today, with his new-found awareness still bubbling away, Snape seemed unable not to do so. She, like her bookend brothers, was also finer-featured than in years past. Part of it was simply that she was still young, but there was a difference. Her features were attenuated, fine-drawn; cords stood prominently in her slender neck, and drew his eyes to her collarbones, also prominent, before they disappeared into the neck of her robe. Her square and capable small hands were raw and red, the tendons standing up in ridges from her skin. His eyes traveled back up to her face and found her brown eyes looking back at him, coolly. A very Slytherin look from Miss Granger, he thought, an assessing, incisive, and judgmental look. She took her seat, still staring at him, and Snape looked away.  
  
Time for class to begin. Enough cogitation on his students for one day, even those particular four cut like sheep and segregated from the rest of the seventh-years by that collie-dog, Dumbledore.

~*~

That night, Snape took the opportunity to prowl the Gryffindor corridors not long after curfew. He was looking for Weasley, since the odds seemed in Snape's favor to catch the young giant cuddling in a corner somewhere with some foolish girl. He couldn't wait to deduct points.  
  
It took some searching; Weasley had done his homework well in selecting a private spot for snogging. It was a corner in a little-used hallway on the way to the Divination Tower -- not far from the Gryffindor corridors -- sheltered by a long velvet curtain that hung at a nearby window, and behind a statue of a satyr playing his pan-flute. Appropriate to the young man's goatish desires, thought Snape. From a distance he could see the dim glow of torchlight flaming on Weasley's head.  
  
From much closer, really only across the corridor from them, Snape could see that the girl's hands had pushed up Weasley's shirt and were clenching, scraping, clawing up and down, leaving small marks of passion on the youth's muscular back. The girl was obviously quite a bit smaller, since Snape could see only her hands and legs past the youth. He stood for a time, waiting for the most opportune moment to interrupt, when it would do the pair the most good. Or, perhaps, the most harm, depending upon one's point of view. He smirked to himself.  
  
There was a murmur from the girl, a definite instruction that Snape could not quite hear, though he leaned forward. In response to her quiet demand, Weasley shifted, groaning, lifting the girl by her buttocks. He moved her up against the wall, effectively trapping her there between his body and the cold stone, collected moth to the spike of his display pin. She, in her turn, wrapped her blue-jeaned legs around his hips with a small gasp. The change in position brought the girl's head level with Weasley's. The youth's head slanted to the side, and now Snape had his first clear view of the girl's face, from her small nose to the top of her head, and the long spill of her hair. Her mouth was entirely occupied by Weasley's tongue, it appeared. Her eyes were closed. Her hands moved to clench in his red hair. One of his hands, freed now that she was pressed against the wall, roamed swiftly under her tee shirt to knead a round breast, exposing some of her trim and fit abdomen to Snape's black and glittering gaze.  
  
Hermione Granger.  
  
The best mind of her year, being snogged senseless by a _Weasley_.  
  
Snape's eyes narrowed, but as he watched, the girl's eyes opened.  
  
They looked straight into his, holding him frozen in time, for a long moment.  
  
Snape's own body betrayed him, jerking rigidly erect, reaching perfect awareness in an instant. He stared back, unable to look away. For another long, suspended moment, Hermione Granger continued to battle with Weasley's mouth; it was as if Snape could feel her tongue in his own mouth, touching its roof, touching his tongue, learning the edges of his teeth, saliva pooling, tasting of metal or the sizzling tang of a door ward pressed too hard for entry without a password.  
  
It was, perhaps, the moment when Snape's heart metaphorically stopped beating and for the longest second, his desire for the girl was not only a series of chemical reactions controlled by his pituitary gland; it was more than the gaping, libidinal astonishment of a voyeur. It was a fist in the guts, a reaction he could store, following Aristotle's friendly advice, along with his sacred ideals of womankind, side by side with his druid's clothing and his memories of Angharad.  
  
Snape fell back against the wall behind him, swallowing hard, terrifyingly unbalanced by what he was seeing. Granger lifted her head from Weasley's and used her hands in his hair to push his mouth down, down, to dwell at her breast. Watching Snape over her lover's bent head, her brown eyes clinging to his black stare, she lifted the hem of her shirt to allow Weasley better access.  
  
And, Snape knew, she did it so that he himself could see that sweet mound, capped with its pink-taupe nipple, wet with Weasley's saliva, and tight with stimulation. Snape watched as she rocked her blue-jeaned hips forward against Weasley's crotch.  
  
Weasley uttered another groan and sucked at her, hard. There was even a love bite there, on the underside of her right breast. _This is not the first time she has behaved in such a way_ , thought Snape. _Hogwarts Head Girl. An entirely new meaning_. His hands clenched into fists so tight that his knuckles cracked. The little sound brought him back to reality and finally enabled him to look away from her.  
  
Snape cleared his throat, and Weasley flinched. He all but dropped Granger and spun, skin bright red, stammering. His lips were puffy, and there was a love bite on his jaw line. _She put that there, she marked him herself._  
  
"Twenty points from Gryffindor," said Snape, voice dark. Granger stood, not behind Weasley, but where Snape could clearly see her, tugging down her shirt slowly, still holding Snape's gaze, wiping her mouth on the back of her hand, pulling her shirt taut over her breasts, outlining them clearly. "Back to your dormitories, this instant. You are out after curfew, even for seventh years."  
  
Snape turned, grateful for the concealment of his robe, and strode away. The next Advanced Potions class would be a bitch, plain and simple. Snape was no innocent; but something in him had been destroyed tonight. And something else had been returned to life, something long dormant. Searing desire. Not simple physical needs, easily assuaged in Hogsmeade or London, but a fierce wanting that would make him ill.  
  
And there was not a shred left of the peace acquired at dawn. Not even a trace.


	5. Chapter 5

"How long can a girl be tortured by you  
How long before my dignity is reclaimed  
How long can a girl be haunted by you  
Soon I'll grow up and I won't even flinch at your name  
Soon I'll grow up and I won't even flinch at your name  
...  
What are you my god? You touch me like you are my god  
What are you my twin? You affect me like you are my twin"  
  
\-- Flinch. Alanis Morissette.  
  
  
"You have a love bite on your neck, Harry."  
  
"Oh, that," he mumbled, automatically reaching with his hand to cover the place. "It's nothing."  
  
Hermione lifted her gaze from the Ancient Runes manuscript she had been reading. "Is it?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
"Who is it you're dating? I thought you broke up with Ginny over the summer."  
  
"Yes, I did. I told you, Hermione, it's nothing. Just drop it."  
  
"Well," Hermione contemplated her words. "I'd hardly call it nothing when your sex life prevents you from arriving on time to two DA meetings or puts those bluish circles under your eyes."  
  
"And I," Harry retorted coolly, "hardly call it nothing when you become suddenly cranky overnight and leave my best friend with a continuing hard-on for the following couple of weeks."  
  
She conquered the desire to slam the book she had been holding, and instead, closed it carefully and put it aside. "Go to hell, Harry."  
  
"Would love to." He yawned lazily, stretching his doll-like, delicate limbs -- now defined by an elegant layer of muscles -- in a way that made his school robes cling to his small figure. "Won't you invite me to sit down?"  
  
Hermione pursed her lips. "I'm not in the mood for company."  
  
Harry rolled his eyes and sat down on the worn out couch beside her. It was five o'clock, some time before sunset, and the students were utilizing what time was left of daylight to be hanging around the castle's grounds. The common room was relatively empty, and the Gryffindors' cheery rumble ascended to the low ceiling, clinging to the fire-warmed stonewalls.  
  
Hermione's carefully brewed tea was meticulously placed on the small coffee table before her, the china mug located exactly at the center of the china saucer, half-way drunk as she slowly went through her Ancient Runes text. Truth was she'd rather read it in her private Head Girl's room, but being a Head Girl, she also had responsibilities towards the Gryffindor student body. Therefore, she felt obligated to spend as much of her free time (which was sparse anyhow) as possible, in the Gryffindor common room.  
  
Harry's arrival at this hour was quite unexpected. The quiet, bespectacled boy seemed to grow almost as busy as Hermione these last couple of months. And only a little of it, Hermione suspected, had to do with the person with whom he was sleeping. His tardiness to the DA's meetings was only a weapon she used to bait him, even though he did arrive at one meeting -- only a month ago -- reeking of sex. No, she thought, Harry was driving towards his own ends, privately contemplating his moves, to finally determine from which point he'd be allowed to reach the chessboard at the moment of truth.  
  
"So," he said.  
  
"I told you," Hermione repeated, "I'm not in the mood for company."  
  
"Not company. Being with someone as fucked up as you doesn't count for company."  
  
"You watch your language, Harry!" she scolded him. "And I'm not... like that."  
  
"Like what?" the messy-haired boy mocked her. "Like _me_?"  
  
"That's not what I meant and you know it."  
  
"That's exactly what you meant, Hermione. You know, it takes one to know one."  
  
"I am perfectly normal, thank you."  
  
Harry rolled his eyes. "You're talking as if being normal is a good thing."  
  
"And so should you."  
  
"Oh, really?"  
  
"Well, what is so good about being... about having," the fingers of her right hand began tapping a nervous rhythm on her thigh. "About having... certain reactions to... given situations?"  
  
"What's so good about being normal and blind and sensing the world through a dozen extra layers of skin? I didn't say having the reactions you do is good either, but nothing is ever just good or bad. Why, look at me, I’m beginning to sound like some magazine's agony aunt."  
  
"You’re beginning to sound mature."  
  
"Yeah? Then I suppose I'll use the opportunity to ask you to give some to Ron."  
  
She glared at him. "My private affairs are none of your business, Harr-"  
  
"Oh, come on, Hermione! The guy is dying from a lack of blood above pelvis level!"  
  
"If, in your opinion, Ron's condition is that severe, you may see to his sexual urges yourself."  
  
"I hardly think he'll care," Harry noted, giggling. "You should have heard him the morning after you two were caught by Snape. He had totally freaked out. Swore to me his hard-on went off on the spot the moment he realised the greasy git was there watching you."  
  
"Shame he couldn't keep it that way."  
  
"He's seventeen, love. What _do_ you expect of him?"  
  
"To masturbate."  
  
The Boy-Who-Lived to be Hermione's Granger's closest thing to a gal pal chuckled. "Such an understanding of the hormonal nature of the seventeen year old male, Hermione. No wonder you make such a wonderful girlfriend. Well, I've had enough _not-company_ for the evening. Being seventeen myself, I think I'll go get me some more love bites," he bantered viciously. "And you, on the other hand, please give improving Ron's sex life some thought, okay? For all our sakes."  
  
"Go get yourself laid, Harry," she dismissed him. "And leave me alone."  
  
He smirked, and leaping gracefully to his feet, swept out of the Gryffindor common room. Sighing, she watched Harry disappear behind the Fat Lady's swiveling portrait, and sank deeper into the overstuffed armchair. Marvelous. The exact thing she needed being served to her like St John's head on a silver platter, in the form of Harry's fractured-crystal giggles and his not-so-innocent remark about Ron's reaction to the incident, two weeks ago in the Gryffindor corridor.  
  
The incident was burnt unskillfully and therefore brutally on her brain's temporal lobe -- like a thirteen year old girl's first attempts at self-mutilations, using the blade she had disconnected from her single-use shaving razor. It left scars -- long and ugly, swollen with a thin, sugary filling of yellowish pus -- that hurt and itched like hell, drawing her mind each time to the exact spot where the fabric of her school shirt brushed against her forearm.  
  
She was sickeningly nervous that day after the almost-encounter in the forest, sizzling with the newfound knowledge of him. Advanced Potions was spent staring at her Potions Master. The poisonous clouds ascending from her bubbling caldron, allowed her the relative safety of being protected from Snape's piercing gaze, as she imagined him fucking her from behind. In her fantasy, he was whispering instructions in her ear while she stirred the complex concoction. The moment the lesson was over, Hermione faltered to the Prefects' bathroom. Warding the door behind her, she lifted her skirt and without much ado, found her engorged clitoris, bringing herself to orgasm within two minutes. Her right hand sticky with her own juices, she then stumbled to the huge bathtub. Crouching in front of it, she had shakily opened the brass taps. Boiling water hissed and churned as they splashed against the porcelain, and Hermione brought her hands under the stream. The scalding hot water burnt the bertholine off her hands together with a fresh layer of pink dermis.  
  
Nevertheless, the quick orgasm in the Prefects' bathroom was only momentarily enough to satiate her. That climax had felt as if she had to wring it out of her body: long minutes after, Hermione was still leaning against the heavy wooden door, heaving painfully with the same kind of exhaustion one experiences after having sneezed three or four times in row.  
  
She spent the hours preceding her coming meeting with Harry and Ron attempting to tell her Id to shut the fuck up. Sublimation through intellectual endeavors proved to be useful only up to a certain point, at which Hermione threw aside her research in favour of some anaerobic exercise. After an hour of push ups, pull ups and stomach crunches -- her muscles screaming from lack of oxygen -- Hermione had once again made her way to the Prefects' bathroom, this time, to let the hot water melt away the lactic acid buildup.  
  
At ten minutes past eight, she put her Arithmancy homework -- with one more theorem to go -- aside, replaced her school uniform with some worn out jeans and a t- shirt she felt most comfortable practicing hexes with, and at eight twenty-five, was first to arrive at the Room of Requirement. Harry and Ron, attached at the hip like in the good old days, arrived together precisely nine minutes later.  
  
Ron, affectionate as ever, kissed her noisily on her lips. A public display of affection she didn't appreciate. Hermione pursed her lips, but said nothing. Even with the former exercise having somewhat numbed her senses, she had yet been sensitive enough to have something inside her ignite in response to the touch of his mouth on hers.  
  
Ron smiled. "Been waiting for us?"  
  
She glared at him. "Apparently I have."  
  
Harry, behind Ron's back, was imitating her. Like Hermione, he stood frozen in his place, wearing his best mien of 'I'm a frigid bitch'; the one he usually used in order to mock those of the girl he dated who wouldn't let him fondle their breasts. He always did it out of Hermione's eye-sight, of course, but then, the boys never gave her as much credit as they should have.  
  
Hermione crossed her arms across her chest. "Stop it, Harry!"  
  
"What's he doing?" Ron asked, turning to look at his best friend.  
  
"Making an ass of himself," she replied. "Now stop fooling around -- _yes Harry_ , I meant you. We have some counter hexes to practice."  
  
And so they did, casting complicated hexes on each other and attempting to throw them off. First in pairs, with the third person watching, then -- after some practice, when the three of them felt secure enough in their abilities -- in the form of open combat. The Room of Requirement became a battle zone, one in which their overgrown five-year-old selves could conduct an extremely wide scale pillow fight.  
  
At last, they found themselves sprawled, panting on the floor. Ron's head was resting in Hermione's lap; vivid, outspoken red against the yawning, mumbled cotton of her t-shirt. Harry was lying beside her, his chest rising and falling in short, strenuous breaths: trying to pump in as much oxygen as possible. His left hand was thrown backward -- in a sweet, marionette-like carelessness -- his little finger unintentionally brushing the curve of her right breast.  
  
The accidental touch scratched the match of her desire alight. Hermione leaned away from Harry's touch, and her hand shot out, hurriedly closing her fingers around Ron's wrist. "We're late. It's almost an hour past curfew."  
  
The redheaded boy groaned. His pulse underneath the tips of her fingers was still a little hastened: wide-eyed vessels adapting mirthfully, to endow Ron's freckled skin with a sweet, rosy hue. She moistened her lips, her vagina throbbing and clenching around a painfully missing cock. The quickened, rhythmic heart beats of the male whose head rested in her lap -- pulsing onto her palm -- were like sweet, clear water to the lust-crazed Lillith lurking inside her.  
  
Pulling Ron to his feet, she gave Harry an apologetic smile. "I think we really should be-"  
  
"Making up in a darkened corner by now?" Harry yawned in feigned nonchalance. "Yeah, I can definitely see what you're talking about." He arched his brow, glancing suggestively at Hermione's erect nipples, stabbing the fabric of her t-shirt.  
  
"Oh. _Oh!_ " Ron cried out, his face turning the same colour as his hair when he suddenly understood why he was being dragged out of the room. Fiercely blushing, he turned to look at Hermione. "W-why didn't you just say you wanted us to-"  
  
Another minute of this total humiliation and she'd be jumping off the Astronomy Tower. Hermione glowered at her thick-as-usual boyfriend. "Shut up and follow me," she ordered him.  
  
Harry, still lying on the mattress, winked at her. "Don't you worry, mates, I'll take care of things here. You go and have some fun. And watch out for Filch and Mrs. Norris! Gin and I ran into them once- that was an experience _I_ wouldn't like to repeat."  
  
"Hey!" Ron protested at the mentioning of his younger sister, "I didn't know you and Ginny went-"  
  
Hermione cleared her throat loud enough to wake Professor Sprout's sleeping baby mandrakes in greenhouse number four. "Goodnight Harry! See you tomorrow at breakfast!"  
  
With Ron stumbling behind her, they rushed into the Gryffindor corridor. Too needy to wait for them to arrive to her Head Girl's room and not a little aroused by the thought of snogging in the shadowy hallway, latent with the echoes of footsteps, Hermione located a safe spot for them to make out. Having caught plenty of snogging Gryffindors hiding in the darkened niches of the very same corridors, she had a very clear idea of the hallway's faults and advantages. It suddenly seemed so rational that her hunger for sex would be fulfilled by her bat-like hunger for the dark, satiated in a small corner; hidden by blood-thick velvet (the new God said the blood was forbidden, an ancient voice inside her sang an elegy); sheltered behind a statue of a satyr. _Yes_ , she thought hazily, amusedly; crushing her mouth to Ron's lips; _I may be an animal in my desires. The Romans' new God may think I am_.  
  
She laughed at her imagery, the soft sound dying against the redheaded boy's mouth. Her teeth pressed into his lower lip, and she bit it none too gently, then sucked it in. Ron uttered a throaty moan, allowing Hermione's tongue to part his lips and sneak in to explore his mouth. Taking advantage, she trailed her tongue along his milky white teeth, prodding the soft flesh of his inner cheeks and the arched, concaved palate, moaning too as their tongues met, and the sweet wetness was realized as an encounter, a battle. Two objects clashing at a meeting point, fighting for domination. Her hands coiled around his waist, tugging and pulling the worn out fabric of his jumper: fingers digging into warm, taut skin. Inside her, the pressure, the need for friction was only increasing.  
  
She once heard Patil saying that one good kiss was worth a thousand orgasms, and silently rolled her eyes at the empty-headed girl's sentimentalities. Practical to a fault, Hermione Granger could not keep a measure of cynicism from tainting her expression when encountering this sort of banality. In her opinion, sex, as well as every other aspect of life, consisted of a certain set of intensities. Having the practical nature with which she had been endowed, Hermione was keen on producing maximum results and had little patience for what she considered as 'fooling around'. It seemed to explain why she refrained from being occasionally touched, as well as her avoidance of public displays of affection: any she had managed over the years were bursts of true emotion, and it usually left her a little shaken. At other times she wondered whether she was actually numb- remembering the girl with the razor and the sudden, shaking sense of aliveness. With Ron pounding into her, she sometimes felt alive.  
  
"Lift me up," she murmured, lips still moving against his mouth. "I want to feel you against me."  
  
Ron laughed softly, and cupping her buttocks -- long fingers delightfully brushing her cleft through the jeans -- had easily lifted her up and pinned her to the wall. His cock was throbbing against her own pulsing center.  
  
Hermione closed her eyes, savoring the friction, her legs wrapping around Ron's hips and pulling him closer. His lips, still on hers, were devouring her mouth, applying a counteraction to contrast and intensify the slow, excruciating grinding of the hips. Crying out, she buried her hands in Ron's mane of red hair, arching her back as Ron's one free hand roamed under her shirt to cup a rounded breast, crushing one taut nipple the way she taught him to do long ago. With the contra of Ron's slightly roughened fingers on her nipples, the friction was finally maximized and the shock to her system most intense: mouth, nipples, and clitoris stimulated all at once. Time to open her eyes and ride the electric current.  
  
And oh, fuck fuck fuck- who was she fooling to think she was ever alive before, with the bloody razor and her pitiable orgasms. Hermione was resurrected, shaken out of the numbness of her being by one look of recognition from those black, ominous eyes that met hers from across the hallway.  
  
So this is how the moth felt when it flew nearer and nearer to its incandescent death; how those few merciful drops of vinegar tasted on Christ's split lips, or Edmund, the second he had his first taste of the Turkish Delight: the Queen of Narnia’s winter frost gaze scanning him, his face naked at this moment of revelation. Professor Snape. Her White Goddess. Colour of all colours. Colour of no colours at all. He would kill her at winter when the land was dead, and resurrect her at spring, hands buried in her hair; riding her like an animal until the land was fertile again, until summer came and the earth was ready to be enfolded into itself once more- for another, lengthy winter. She, Hermione knew, would be killed again by her lover, so that her blood would soak into the ground and fertilize it.  
  
A shame, that she had become too controlled to be startled out of her skin: a shame that she had grown too vain to fake such reaction. She experienced a sense of unreality, of disassociation: in one universe Ron's mouth was on hers, her tongue teasingly caressing his tongue, flicking on teeth and wet, lush flesh. In the other universe was the whiteness of Snape's burn-like face, scalded against the opaque darkness. Snape, whose unwavering gaze was tearing her apart from the wavering shadows. But no longer. It took only a second for those two realities to merge- for the worldly stimulation she derived from the physical encounter with Ron to shift and turn into the clean, razor-sharp pleasure -- both sexual and intellectual -- she felt upon realizing this man of violent controversy had kept standing still, even though Merlin only knew he should not, watching her with a hunger to match the one that had consumed her for long, long weeks.  
  
Encouraged by the Potions Master's dumbstruck stillness, she found herself distancing her lips from Ron's, pushing his head down: down to her breast -- the one he'd been fondling and tweaking only seconds before -- watching closely for Snape's reaction. Faceless, expressionless; _I wonder... I wonder... who took your expressions away from you and painted that amused mien on your face; am I your Aphrodite and are you my Hephaestus,_ she thought, reaching her hand, fingers twisting and fumbling with the hem of her shirt- _have you just caught me making love to Ares: beautiful, sun-tanned Ares, so unlike you, my disfigured, ugly Hephaestus-..._ Panting, she uncovered a rounded, small breast, feeling Ron's lips close around its sensitive tip.  
  
The unexpected sense of nudity, brought by those dark eyes skimming over her naked skin was making her shiver. There was something freakish about Snape's stare: offering no approval, exposing no secret, _a new kind of nakedness?_ Hermione hypothesized when she saw him clenching his fists. And woke up, as Professor Snape cleared his throat, scaring Ron shitless. It broke their eye connection into a thousand crystal shards -- with which, much later, she might try to cut herself into a dreaming sense of aliveness once again, but hopelessly, because _he_ wouldn't be there to watch her.  
  
Pathetically craving for every bit of recognition, like an alley cat that is diligently collecting small bits of affection, she clung to her Professor's eyes even as they shut off. Pitiable, she was pitiable, a fucking tease, painted with Donna's lipstick, an 'O' shaped gape, designed for men to come and stick their cocks into: Hermione Granger, Head Girl, her year's top student, an exhibitionist, _a slut._ Dirtied. Not only by her own thoughts and actions, but also by those of the people who touched her. Like a whore, letting all those people into her intimate space. Now Ron wasn't clean, or was he? God only knew where he put his hands before touching her, and his mouth, and Harry too- they were lying side by side, he was breathing on her... _NO, you're so not getting into this, Granger, she ordered herself. You're going to indulge in a nice, long, steamy, scraping shower -- which you should not be allowed, by the way -- then you'll go to sleep, and tomorrow, tomorrow is another day._  
  
In the end, Hermione had actually followed her own advice. Tired and scraped red, she sunk into the white linens, curling into her father's lap when he came to visit her in her dream. Lester rocked her gently, stroking her wild mane of honey curls, telling her that no matter what, she'd always be Daddy's little girl. Hermione believed him.  
  
Nevertheless, nothing of the calmness she felt in her father's arms lasted into the morning. The bluish mists that crept from the forest to stain Hogwarts' lawns had slowly dissolved under the sun's insistent pressure, and if anything, the world held this terrifying wrongness about it, of being cornered into the darkest alcove of yourself and not surviving the experience whole. She wanted out. She wanted to be left alone. She wanted to strangle her boyfriend, who approached her first thing in the morning, asking if she was all right and admitting he himself was scared shitless by the creepy bastard. By the creepy bastard, indeed. Not by himself. Above all, she wanted, for the first time in her life, to miss a lesson. Advanced Potions, to be more accurate. And she dreaded the moment when she would have to face the Hogwarts Potions Master once again.  
  
On Wednesday afternoon, descending the stone staircase leading to the dungeons, Hermione still could not contain all her clashing emotions. Facing _him_ was not the problem. The actual encounter, she knew well, was never the problem -- the body was only the conductor of the soul; it went where you told it to go. Were you trained enough, your facial muscles would obey you, and you wouldn't be betrayed by your expression. She'd be able to answer his gaze if she was forced to: she would sit in his class and brew whatever potion he might order her to brew. Inside, she would fall apart piece by piece; an insomniac mole would dig its way inside her body, gnawing the delicate strings attaching Hermione's psyche to reality, slowly but thoroughly disconnecting her from the real world; until she turned hysterical and rushed out of the classroom.  
  
She was careful to make sure Ron and Harry were standing at her sides -- guarding her -- as she entered the cold, musty dungeon room. _Persephone's watch-dogs_ , she mused, daring herself to look at her capturer. Stern, greasy, Professor Snape answered her with a blank gaze. _Good, good. I've got the hint. We're both pretending nothing had ever happened. It's going to make it much easier. Why, then, do I want to cry? So now I'm nothing to you?_ Just like she was yesterday. And the day before. And the moment he looked at her and wanted her. _I was nothing then, as well. You, of all people, Granger, have to know wanting doesn't make it 'a thing'._  
  
Using the same even, deep breathing she practiced when doing Yoga or meditating, Hermione subdued herself into forced calmness. It was hardly enough -- it was the thin slice of butter you could manage on the blade of a knife quantity of enough -- but it was as much as she could expect. That was all she could cling to, to keep herself from bursting into tears, and so she did. All sort of slimy, disgusting, dirty things had somehow appeared on the table in front of her, and Hermione turned sick at the thought that until very recently, she would have touched _these_ without even having flinched.  
  
She made it some way into the potion, her hand shaking with revulsion as she reached for the first nasty ingredient; fresh bat's wings, its ends where it was removed from the body still dripping blood -- and put it on the cutting board.  
  
"Hermione, is everything all right?" Ron -- who already finished chopping the damn wings and adding them to his potion -- leaned to check over on his girlfriend.  
  
"Everything is fine," Hermione whispered. "Go back to your -"  
  
"Miss Granger! Do I need to remind you this class is intended for making potions and not for idle chatter?"  
  
 _Damn the man._ Startled, Hermione dropped the knife she was holding, her guts clenching in disgust as some of the blood clots still tainting the bat wings clung to the knife's wooden hilt.  
  
Snape watched her reactions with narrow eyes, obviously repulsed, it seemed, by her childish withdrawal. "Silly girl," he spat. "Come on, pick up that knife."  
  
Hermione swallowed. The hilt was dirty. "I can't."  
  
The classroom turned silent at once. She heard a soft, crystalline chuckle Hermione had learned to identify with Draco Malfoy, which died out at once the moment the Potions Professor's black eyes shifted to look at him. Those eyes were instantly back on her, scrutinizing her, dissecting her the way he might do with one of his potions ingredients: impersonally, coolly, precisely --but no, the anger was not impersonal. And she didn't want his anger, either. She wanted him to desire her. _I'm pathetic._  
  
Snape's voice, a rich, lucid baritone, rang through the class. "Pick-up-that-knife, Miss Granger."  
  
A muscle in her jaw shrunk. "I told you, I can't."  
  
"Three points from Gryffindor. Pick up that knife. _Now_."  
  
Hermione's lower lip trembled. "I'm sorry, Sir, but I can't."  
  
Professor Snape clenched his jaw. Without further words, he reached for the knife, long, bluish-white fingers closing around the blood stained hilt -- and brutally taking her hand, stuffed the soiled object into it. Unable to control herself, Hermione uttered a cry as her Professor's palm closed around the raw flesh of the back of her hand. Snape's eyes were drawn instantly to the red, angry skin, flashing with something almost like indignation. Standing so close to him, Hermione was suddenly able to notice his eyes weren’t the monochromatic black she always thought they were, but a wild, bewitching grey: so dark it could cut darkness. Foolish, now wasn't she, standing there, romanticizing this hideous, terrible man, when at every moment-  
  
"To the infirmary, this instant," he ordered, dropping her hand and retreating at once -- as if the touch had in some way stung him. "Have Madam Pomfrey look at your hands."  
  
Hermione ignored the sharp stab of pain and humiliation. "Yes, sir."  
  
There was no way she was going to the infirmary, but the slimy bastard didn't have to know that. Either way, she didn't think he would bother to confirm whether she did or did not visit the infirmary with Madam Pomfrey. Dress me slowly because I'm in a hurry, she contemplated the phrase as she picked up her things. No point in stumbling out of the classroom like a hunted animal. Yes- oh yes, the wire was slowly fastening around her leg -- like the orgasm's relentless grip on the body -- the wire was lurking in the darkened corners of the rabbit hutch; drowsing, like the white-blindness, like the plague, asleep until it cropped its next victim.  
  
Hermione felt the wire cutting into the tender skin of her throat when later that week, Ron came to her Head Girl's room -- showered and shaved after a Quidditch practice -- and she couldn't possibly endure his soft caresses.  
  
"What is it, Mio-sorry, what is it, sweet?" A look of confusion and misunderstanding stained Ron's open, easily read face.  
  
She breathed deeply, hurriedly closing the row of buttons at the front of her shirt. "I'm sorry, Ron- I just-" Hermione fought the trap of tears materializing at the back of her throat. "I simply can't."  
  
"It's okay, I understand, after that greasy-"  
  
"No, you don't understand!" she barked at him. "You can't possibly understand!"  
  
Ron stared at her, openly hurt. The hell with him. She hated, hated and hated that mien. This childish, puppy-eyed look, like a kneaded, spread lump of dough, as if inviting her to vengefully perforate it with her fork -- never imagining for a moment this might be the exact thing she wanted to do. That she might just _love_ to plant her foot in this exposed belly of his, if only for him being so innocent and trusting. _If only because she fucking could_. "So why... why don't you tell me," Ron asked, "so I'll understand...?"  
  
Her nostrils flared. "I don't want to talk about that," she heard herself saying. "Please leave me alone."  
  
She watched him leave, careful to hold back her tears until the door had quietly closed behind Ron's back. Only then did Hermione bury her face in the pillow and weep miserably.  
  
Ever since, her life had only seemed to be deteriorating. Ron was understandably cross with her, not hostile, but with all his attempts to reach for her being fenced off, he had eventually become remote. Harry, on the other hand, was his usual, moody self; at one moment melancholic and brooding, and on the other, cheerful and teasing -- often teasing enough to annoy her. Advanced Potions kept being a torment, which was only to be expected: Hermione made the lesson easier by sitting in the back of the class; which seemed to help, pulling the sleeves of her shirt to cover up the back of her hands in case Professor Snape passed by; only that he didn't. She should have probably been grateful. She wasn't. Snape was ignoring her intentionally and his attitude was driving her crazy.  
  
 _Like any good exhibitionist, the only thing that affects me more than being watched, is being ignored. I wonder if he knows that_ , Hermione mused after she had finally put the Ancient Runes volume aside. Except she didn't actually think so. After all, what else, in fact, should Professor Snape have done? Hand her the kind of detention to see the two of them expelled from Hogwarts? What would _she_ have done anyway, had he approached her? Freaked out, probably. Fucked him, or let him fuck her -- Professor Snape never appeared to Hermione like the type to be fucked by a woman- by a man, maybe, but not by a woman -- then soaped herself out of her skin? Rather like Eustace, clawed from under his Dragon hide, only that there would be no alternative Hermione under her current shell, only panting, bleeding marrow. _Well, that was enough Narnian imagery for one month_ , she decided. _Doubt Snape ever heard of the series, pureblood bastard that he is. Time to get some fresh air._  
  
Some physical exercise should agree with her at this point- running perhaps. It had been a while, three or four days, in fact, since she had been to the Stones. Hermione had missed their fey, ethereal or perhaps, utterly worldly -- that of an ancient world, long gone -- quality. Much like the students, she thought, she would utilize this last hour of daylight and would be back just in time for dinner.  
  
Without further hesitation, she turned to her room where she changed for running. She had quickly exited the castle; easily jogging down the mild slope leading down the cliff on top of which Hogwarts was located. Hermione was almost surprised to feel how the chilly October air penetrated her lungs. The biting, sharpened-teeth cold, it seemed, collapsed and ruined delicate layers of soft tissues, which stopped oxygen from filling her lungs properly.  
  
Taking her time, she made it to the Stones in about five minutes, smiling at their long, curvy shadows that fell beautifully unto the grass: like closed-eyed women waiting to fall trustingly into the arms of their lovers. They were soft and welcoming, especially once she finally managed to counter the nasty ward that had been cast on them -- probably by a possessive, small-hearted Hogsmeader who had a hard time grasping the concept of sharing.  
  
From afar, the place seemed deserted; the way Hermione found it every time she visited the Stones. She slowed her pace, not wishing to stop at once, the soft, gentle swish of cloth brushing against the grass suddenly reaching her ears. She frowned. Who else would be visiting the Stones at such an hour, a little before sunset?  
  
Then she heard his voice: that low, rich, beautiful baritone seemed to echo from the grass, and shine clear and lucid from the Stones- she knew he was saying words, or better said: knew he must be speaking words, but she was too confused to unknot them from the thick, honeyed mess that was his voice and didn't leave even one place in her body untouched. _He is the blood that runs in my blood_ , Hermione thought hazily. Dumbstruck -- like a mongoose caught in the flashlight of a car in the middle of the night -- she ordered herself to move. Right away, before he'd caught her.  
  
This was total foolhardiness....! She should not be romanticizing Professor Snape, or act like the heroine of a silly paperback. There was no bloody wire, only a narrative running in her head like rope: one she would coil around her neck, very likely to condemn herself to be hanged with if she's to continue to behave in this manner. Get the fuck out of here, Granger, she ordered herself- _come on, on your feet, that's a good girl. Now don’t look, I said DON’T LOOK_. But she did. And she was lost.  
  
 _Bad for you, Granger_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> * Dress me slowly because I'm in a hurry -- Napoleon Bonaparte.
> 
> * "She is the blood that runs in my blood" -- a rather free translation of a line from Rachel Bluwstein's, "Rachel".


	6. Water for the New Moon

floating hands were laid upon me  
I was whirled and tossed into delicious dancing  
up  
Up  
with the pale important  
stars and the Humorous  
moon

\--from "your little voice"

\-- e.e.cummings

It was more than aggravating, the way the images lived on the underside of his eyelids. For many hours, all of Monday night and most of Tuesday, with each blink, each brief sleep before his personal demon insomnia struck again, each closure of his eyes against headache or bright light, each squint and eye-rub, Snape saw again that moment of the girl's awakening in the arms of her red-headed lover. Saw again the heavy lids that lifted, languorous with desire, saw again the dreaming dark eyes that met and held Snape's own, drew him in, swallowed his soul, or what there was of it.

It was more than aggravating, indeed: it was torture.

Snape knew himself to be obsessed, and could not understand the reason for it. Granger was his student; he had watched her grow for years, from a small know-it-all to a young woman, still a know-it-all, though more rigidly controlled this year than in years past. Her composure this year was a clever construction of intelligence and confidence in her abilities, allied with a new distance from everyone around her that he attributed to the knowledge that a battle with Voldemort was approaching, and she would likely be a warrior in it. Snape had always been well able to ignore his students; none of them had ever affected him in this way before.

It wasn't just because he'd caught her snogging in the hallway with Weasley. He'd caught more students than he cared to count, over the years. And now Snape no longer kept score of the points he'd deducted...instead, he preferred to remember the "special moments" -- those little shrieks, the students that actually tripped and fell down when he appeared, the girls that cried and begged not to have detention or points deducted, the boys that stammered and blushed, even the lover who became combative in defense of the other's honor.

But to have deducted twenty points...Snape could still hear Minerva even now. Tuesday morning's breakfast had been a horror show of temper on both their parts, with Flitwick so anxious that he'd broken four teacups because of his reaction to the bad vibrations between Snape and Minerva. Twenty points...that was excessive, and Snape knew it; especially for seventh years only an hour past curfew, and for the most part, fully clothed.

He could only blame his visceral, knee-jerk reaction on the sight of Hermione's breast, and her knowing, seeking, compelling gaze. Granger's breast, he self-edited mercilessly. Having seen her nipple did not give him the right to think of her so familiarly. He'd been deeply shocked by his body's reaction. Snape was not a voyeur. He had normal drives; he satisfied himself with willing women, women who were not dismayed by his appearance, and appeared pleased with his physical accomplishments in bed. He had never before thought of taking a student for sexual pleasure, but if he left his eyes closed for very long, parallel universes merged in his brain and it was always he who had the girl lifted against the corridor wall, his hair her fingers twined through, his mouth she drank from, his lips on her breast, his waist her legs tightened around, his erection rocking against the seam of her jeans. Weasley be damned. Weasley was never in the picture once her eyes had opened and drawn Snape in.

Dumbledore would fillet his guts if he knew. Snape shuddered. And the parents would be told. Muggles, both of them dentists. Likely they were good with sharp instruments, and would assist with the filleting.

And Minerva...her voice had been remarkably active in his mind since Monday night. Granger was a particular pet of Minerva's, the same sort of scary-bright student Minerva had likely been in her youth. Minerva was telling him how to handle this: with cool detachment. Nothing, really, had happened. He hadn't touched the girl. He'd frankly seen more flesh any number of times, more intimate contact, by students who had thought they were safe from discovery. Even the Slytherins, who tended to slide past the dungeon wards and get up to mischief in the chill of the dungeon classroom because he was their Head of House and not apt to punish severely, were less circumspect than Granger and Weasley had been.

Tuesday morning and early afternoon, it rained hard. Snape was pleased; his supply of ritual water needed replenishing, especially with his new moon celebration a little less than two weeks away. Snape was very glad when the last class of the day was over.

While the sun was still above the horizon, he took his stoneware flask and went walking through the edge of the Forbidden Forest, visiting the oaks with hollows in their trunks. At each, he said Angharad's blessing, before draining the hollows of their water, straining it through two thicknesses of woven lamb's wool. The result was a sort of tannic tea, clear, yet tinted sepia, redolent of wood.

"May wind bend you, not break you. May rain slake your thirst. May sunlight stretch your limbs. May your children be strong."

When the flask was full, Snape continued his walk. He headed for the Stones. He approached them up the avenue, as usual.

He was comfortable here. He sat on the altar stone, breathing the early evening air, and looking about him. Snape wouldn't stay long this evening, but the peace was soothing.

Autumn. What colored leaves there had been at the edges of the Forest, where the light was strongest and the choking black roses were few and far between, had mostly fallen in the day's heavy rain. The last of the Michaelmas daisies were looking ragged in the open spaces around the Stones.

He amused himself with the fallen leaves, writing "SNAPE" and "SLYTHERIN" in bright red maple in the center of the circle, pointing his wand. Then with a wave of his hand, he erased those words, and wrote three others in the leaves.

ANGHARAD.

MINERVA.

LILY.

Snape frowned. Two of those were correct, in his personal incarnations of the Triple Goddess. Angharad, his past, his mentor. Minerva, his present, his conscience. But Lily was dead, and she had never been part of his future, though he had once wished it so. He waved them all away, swirling the leaves at last into the shape of the Slytherin serpent mascot.

Angharad of the dark hair, with silver streaks. Angharad, of the Welsh-blue eyes: "To covet is to steal, Severus."

"Yet I have nothing, nothing in my hands, Angharad." He showed her his empty palms. Twenty four, and waiting for...what? Something to fill the void, even then.

"Still, my pupil, in your heart you took that which was not yours."

Glaring look in response to her gentle correction. "I didn't touch Lily, not after she asked me not to. I would never do such a thing. Why do you not speak to me of my time as a Death Eater? Why dredge up the hopeless fantasies of a seventeen-year-old, isolated and alone?" This lesson on coveting came too late, he felt. He'd needed it at seventeen, when the lure of the Dark was strong and appealing, when James Potter had taken Lily from him, once and for all.

"You wanted to be her only friend, allow her to spend time with no one else."

"What's wrong with that? I didn't have other friends." Toss of black head, flash from dark eyes. "They were all foolish, young, frivolous. Lily was different. Deeper. Clever. She loved me."

Another gentle smile. "You should have met others, as well, however, instead of limiting yourself to gazing from afar on one who was already taken. And you will meet others, some day. But first...learn to tie these knots, Severus. You cannot perform the rituals with me until you can tie the knots."

"They are just knots, Angharad."

"They have meaning, symbolism. They are secure, in and of themselves, whole without need of other things. As you must learn to be, Severus."

"...there."

"Good. Now practice, until you can do it without looking, until you can do this in the dark, or blind, or asleep."

Snape shook himself. It was getting dark, and colder. Coveting. Wanting what isn't mine to take. Wasn't that what he'd done last night? He rose, letting himself out past the wards, and returned to the Castle.

Once there, he went into his office and closed the door and poured himself a shot of whiskey, then a second, and finally a third. He ignored Conscience Minerva, who was saying steadily, monotonously, "Exchanging one problem for another will not help." She shut up shortly after the third drink. Sleep, when it came, was mercifully blank for a period of several hours. He woke much later, head down on the desk, the imprint of his fingers and signet ring in his cheek, and moved to his quarters to finish the night lying on his back in his bed, staring at the ceiling. Rest had helped; and remembering Angharad's words about coveting had helped even more. He didn't see the girl each time he closed his eyes, though she was still a frequent visitor. But tomorrow was Wednesday, and in the afternoon, Advanced Potions. And he was dreading it for the first time in his life, actual dread, not just irritated resignation.

~*~

Snape's Advanced Potions students were filing into class again. Granger would be among them, as usual. His headache, born of too much whiskey, too much introspection and too little sleep, was strengthening rapidly. He pinched the bridge of his nose.

When she entered the classroom, she was flanked again by her bookend brothers. This time, however, there was a difference, a menace, in the stances of the young men. They were clearly guarding their darling girl. Weasley's head was up, meeting Snape's eyes, though hot color stained his cheeks. Snape managed a cool look at the three of them, quickly moving on to assess the students following the trio. He'd given them no reason to feel menaced; but it was clear the twenty points stung.

There. A difficult moment, passed without incident. Snape began the lesson as usual. Today the class would be brewing a noxious potion to ward off the depredations of spider-silk-chewing moths. Snape opened the high dungeon windows and sent a slight breeze through the room, to waft away the fumes, but still the cauldrons produced much colored steam and smoke.

He sat at his desk, grading papers, while the class worked in relative silence. Occasionally, quill pausing in its brushing caress of his lips and jaw as he thought, he looked up to check the group. Things appeared to be progressing well...the purpling smoke and steam rose fairly uniformly from all the cauldrons.

Each time he looked up, Granger's eyes were upon him from the other side of her steam cloud. Such resentment, he thought. And all because I saw a nipple? Surely not. There must be more, something stemming from the moments their gazes had locked in that dark corridor. What had she seen in his eyes? How much of her essence had he stolen for himself in those moments, endless then, and endlessly replayed?

When Snape returned to the present from his thoughts -- his desk, the papers -- he discovered that his blank, unfocused gaze had been turned in Granger's direction yet again. Her face was darkly pink, her mouth tight, her lashes half-mast as she stared into her cauldron. She was stirring her cauldron in a jerky, automatic fashion. Potter and Weasley were both looking at her oddly. Stop it, Snape. Weasley, just a name. Just a youth. Not an enemy. Certainly not a rival!

The steam from her cauldron was the wrong color. Most unlike her; usually, Granger's potions were perfectly timed, perfectly stirred, perfectly measured -- always, simply, perfect; but now she was staring at something in front of her, rigid, frozen, distressed. Snape's brow rose.

"Hermione, is everything all right?" Weasley, speaking out of the side of his mouth to her, his eyes darting from Granger to Snape, and back again.

Shaken out of her stillness for a moment, Granger whispered back, "Everything is fine. Go back to your --"

Snape rose, his hands on his desk, the quill forgotten and leaking ink on some student's parchment -- for which, not realizing it was his own fault, Snape would later deduct points for sloppiness -- and interrupted the pair. He would have no wooing, no courting, no liaisons planned in his class. Especially not this pair.

"Miss Granger! Do I need to remind you this class is intended for making potions and not for idle chatter?"

There was a clatter from her lab table as the knife she was holding fell from her fingers. Her brown eyes lifted to his glittering gaze for a long moment. When she looked back down at the bloody knife, and the bits of bat clinging to it, Snape was suddenly certain she was about to vomit. He could see her throat working convulsively from his desk. He came around it, moving quickly towards her. Merlin, what was wrong with the girl? It was incomprehensible to him.

"Silly girl. Come on, pick up that knife." He couldn't keep his sneering sarcasm at bay; it spilled over her like a sour wave. He saw her shudder.

She swallowed yet again. Snape could almost feel her gorge rising in his own throat. What was so horrifying about bat wings? She'd chopped them up for years, why were they suddenly problematic?

"I can't." Her voice was quiet, and it trembled.

Snape's classroom went silent. All heads turned. All heads turn as the hunt goes by, rattled a nonsense verse from his childhood, flashing through his brain. The fairy hunt. It had always seemed so frighteningly ominous to the imaginative child he had been, until he'd become a Death Eater and learned what ominous really was. Evil gnome king Snape, hunting Hermione the nymph in his classroom.

There was a chuckle, a musical jostling of crystals. Malfoy. Snape's head swung to the blond wizard, who, startled to be pinned by that hateful black glare for perhaps the first time in his Hogwarts career, let his laughter die out and his smile vanish. Snape's focus returned to Granger. Her eyes met his in shamed fascination. Prey sparrow. Predator owl.

"Pick up that knife, Miss Granger." His voice was the only sound there was, aside from an occasional glutinous spitting pop from the cauldrons.

She clenched her jaw, and again Snape felt his gorge wanting to rise, almost in sympathy, which was not possible. "I told you, I can't."

He was too close, but he wasn't stopping. "Three points from Gryffindor. Pick up that knife. Now."

Her lower lip trembled, drawing his gaze there instantly. That mouth leaves love bites on Weasels.

"I'm sorry, Sir, but I can't."

He reached for the knife with his left hand, and her right hand with his own right hand, and smacked the handle into her palm. His hand clenched around hers to close her fingers over the wooden handle, and she cried out in pain, the sound clear and sharp as a fire alarm in his ears.

That sound reached his consciousness as none of her words had. I've hurt her. Have I cut her? He looked down at her hand in his and saw the rawness, the redness, the oozing of lymph, the cracked flesh. An electric shock jolted through his entire body. What have you done to yourself, Hermione? He dropped her hand as though he'd been struck across the face. The redness extended up her arms, welts, scratches, ragged edges of torn skin, disappearing past her wrists -- both wrists -- under the sleeves of her robe. The knife clattered to the tabletop again.

"To the infirmary, this instant," he ordered. He caught himself backing away from her as though she had frightened him, and made himself stop before he backed into some dunderhead's work area. "Have Madam Pomfrey look at your hands."

"Yes, sir."

She left his class. The room was still silent. He stalked back to his desk. "Mr Potter."

"Yes, sir?" The Boy-Who-Was-A-Pest met his gaze, and Snape clearly read the disapproval and anger there, but chose to ignore it. Snape had done enough damage for this week, he thought.

"Attend to Miss Granger's cauldron. Pour that mess down the sink; it has failed and will shortly curdle. Rinse it away while it's still liquid."

"Yes, sir."

~*~

Much later, at dinner, Snape turned to Poppy Pomfrey as she walked to her chair.

"How are Miss Granger's hands? I was afraid she burned herself with the potion we were making in class today."

"Miss Granger? Hermione?"

"Is there another Granger at this school, Poppy? One who has not, perhaps, passed through my dungeon?" he snarked.

"Why should I have tended to her hands, Severus? Were they hurt?"

Snape scowled. "Did I not just say that? They looked...irritated, raw," he said. "I specifically sent her to you. Did she never arrive?"

Poppy shook her head and continued to her chair, affronted as usual by his rudeness.

~*~

It was the afternoon of the new moon.

Snape was more than ready for his next ritual at the Stones. He desperately needed the peace he felt he would find there. These recent days had proved difficult; there had even been a summons from Voldemort in the past week, a strategy planning session. And not only did he see the girl's eyes frequently, now he watched her hands as well. Some days were better than others for the tight, red skin, but always there was irritation, rawness. He had not yet discerned a pattern.

After the last class of the day, Snape returned to his quarters and bathed swiftly but thoroughly, washing the fumes and sweat from his body with his favorite soap, scented with fresh fir needle. This late in the autumn, there was not much daylight left after classes, and he still had a long walk to reach the Stones after his preparation.

Back in the dungeon, Snape opened the flask of ritual water and poured a gill into the bowl.

Hands, my works. Cleansed. Hurry, evening comes, dry faster.

Head, my thoughts. Cleansed.

Heart, my will. Cleansed.

Mouth, my words. He drank the last water in the bowl, as Angharad had taught. Cleansed.

He wrapped himself in his wool loincloth, using the sacred knot his hands knew so well. Clothed. Angharad, I can tie the knots in my sleep. Does that make me whole?

The sandals. Clothed.

The white robe, belted with the rope, secured with the same knot. Clothed.

Angharad's cloak, swung over his shoulders. Clothed.

He threaded the sickle's thong through his belt. Prepared.

And at last, another small white cloth, this time already holding the bundle of incense: shaved orris root, slivers of fragrant apple wood, and chunks of fly-trapped amber resin, which would melt with delicious fragrance in his fire. Prepared.

He tucked his flask of oak water under his arm. Time to go.

Snape looked at his black teaching robe, and could not bear to put it on. He would risk it, this one time; dusk drew near, and perhaps he would be quick enough, to distance himself from the Castle without being seen in his whiteness. He escaped into the early chill of the evening, pulling up the hood of the cloak to hide his face. If he was seen, perhaps no one would recognize him. It never occurred to him that his thin frame, so tall, was recognizable even without the arch of his aquiline nose projecting past the edge of the hood.

When he entered the Circle, he missed the sizzle of his wards, and frowned. He'd warded the Circle strongly last time he'd visited. Someone's been here, undoing my work. Once again he would set the wards as he left.

Druid Snape went quickly to the altar; the sun was almost down, and in the dusk the Stones seemed to be speaking: hushed, murmuring words, their lengthening shadows reaching for one another, linking Stone to Stone in a nearly tangible ring. He frowned, but continued. It was atypical, but then his spirit had felt quite disturbed for days, and so he attributed the noise to the noise within himself.

Snape turned to face the west, and the sun, slipping out of sight now. That last rim of crimson blossomed, tinting the Stones with blood. He bowed his head and spoke quietly to the setting sun. "Lugh, rest."

Back to the east then, to usher in the new moon, invisible, dark.

"Arianrhod," he spoke quietly. In the normal course of events he would have spoken clearly, strongly, but tonight he felt quelled and awed. "Welcome." He lay his bundle of incense on the altar and set his flask of water on the ground next to the altar stone. Once the fire had consumed his incense he would pour water on the altar for the new moon to drink.

He straightened, removing the sickle from his belt. He set its inner curve to the pad of his thumb, and drew it across his skin, scoring, drawing blood.

"East, into the first of the Night." A single drop of blood into the orris and apple wood and amber.

"West, into the last of the Light." Another drop.

"South, into the warm Spark." Another.

"North, into the chill Dark." And the last.

Snape put his thumb to his mouth to lick away the rest of his blood according to Angharad's ritual.

He took a wide stance, lifted his head to the darkening sky, and called for the Needfire.

This time was different, yet he had not varied from what he remembered of the ceremony from years past with his mentor.

This time, he felt a surge, swirling around his ankles like cold ground fog from wet grass at dusk, rising up his body, lifting the cloak and its dense pelt of feathers. Now... now, it could fly, but not in any earthly wind -- and no longer just billow.

When he looked down at the stone, thin trails of smoke were rising, silver in the dusk. The cuckoo called, once and sharply. The Needfire had come at his bidding.

Severus Snape fell to his knees. He had done something right, for a change. The trouble was, he didn't know what. Fill me anyway, he thought. I am cleansed, clothed, and prepared for a soul.

Druid Snape was shaken.

He was elated.

And he was not alone in his Circle.

He did not see Hermione's slim figure pressed hard against one of the Stones as she stared, fascinated, observing his ritual. As the energy level increased and became a whirling vortex, leaping from Stone to Stone to Stone, Hermione had to flinch away from the buzzing and stinging Stone she had been pressed against. It was her startled cry that caught Snape's ear and made him turn his head before he scrambled to his feet and approached her swiftly, his face terrible in his sudden fury. Behind him on the altar stone, the flames went higher, consuming the offering, and throwing his face into shadow.

She turned in her trainers and tried to escape the Circle, only to have that band of energy stretch but not give, and fling her back into the Circle to land against Snape's chest. She flinched away in panic, but by then he had caught her. He turned her to face him, holding tight to her upper arms to control her desperate, flailing movements.

"Why are you here?" he demanded. "Why did you follow me? What did you see?"

"Let go of me, you crazy drag queen!" Hermione hissed. Her eyes were wild, seeking from side to side for a weapon, for an exit, for escape from his capture. She twisted frantically in his grip. The light film of perspiration on her skin, slick against his palms, along with her surprising strength, allowed her to break away from him momentarily. With a lunge, Snape caught her a second time, by one wrist, and was stunned when she pivoted on one foot and slammed her other foot hard against his hipbone, choking out, "I said get off!" The sudden change of inertia spun him backwards and he fell, landing hard on his arse. Hermione ran for the edge of the circle a second time. But this time she seemed to sense the foaming power there before she touched it again, and stopped, facing him, panting.

"You can't leave," said Snape. He got carefully to his feet, watching her for signs of a new attack. Fierce girl, what are you so afraid of? "Neither of us can leave, until the ritual is complete and that ring of force dies back." He walked towards her, but she flung her hands up to ward him off. Prey sparrow, predator owl.

Those red, cracked hands. Snape stopped, staring at them. He looked at his own hands, long, thin, white, a little moist from where he'd touched her flesh. Moist. There was an insane urge welling up within him to lick his palms, and in that way somehow taste her. He clenched his hands into fists to stifle that urge.

Hermione turned back to the gap between the stones, and with one hand, reached as far over her head as possible. Snape saw her trembling fingers feel for the energy, and twitch back as she found it, high above her. She trailed her fingers downward slowly, still feeling that energy, taking it all the way to the ground, and then from side to side between the two stones. She kept wary eyes on him.

She thinks you're about to leap on her, Snape, he told himself. She's in your snare, and wants to escape. Will do anything to escape. His eyes closed briefly, and of course she was there again, behind his lids, her mouth, her eyes, the dark corridor. The stony satyr. Merlin. Not now. Think about your ritual. Focus, or all will be wasted. He swallowed hard and lowered his hands. "The power makes a wall. We can't yet leave," he said again.

He moved a step closer, and she did not run. "Miss Granger."

Her eyes lifted briefly, but then dropped again, to the white wool of his robe, the pale sisal rope belt. He heard her draw a slow breath, her eyes narrowing when she frowned in concentration; Snape recognized that look from numberless classes, as she thought through a potion and the ingredients before her.

One of her raw, red hands reached to touch the edge of the cloak, still flying on its own about him, lashing them both in its wild motion as it responded to the energy whirling around them. "How very pale..." The words were uttered with a certain amusement, but he could hear the thin layer of longing undermining the amusement.

Carefully, as if she expected Snape to swat away her hand at any moment, Granger reached to touch his robe, his rope belt, and then the sickle, running the tip of her index finger along the sharp side of the curved blade. He remembered the incident with her knife, days ago, when his touch had caused such emotion to erupt in her. Abruptly he was angry; how dare she interfere in his ritual? He made an exasperated motion.

Then he heard her say, as if to herself, "Clean."

"Really," he muttered. "Think again, Miss Granger. This is a crazy drag queen in front of you, didn't you say? Does that make me clean?"

It seemed she hadn't even heard him. She stood before him in her tee shirt and shorts, trainers and short socks, dressed mostly in white herself. He needed her attention, and took hold of her shoulder, shaking her sharply. "Miss Granger. How much did you see?"

She flinched back. "Don't touch me," she spat. "If you mean, did I see you masturbating there on your altar in your lovely new dress, no -- I must have missed that part. And I'm sure I'm not sorry."

Snape felt ire flood him at this comment. "Miss Granger, no one asked you to pry into my personal business, my personal rituals, my attire, to spy on me as you have done, and invade my privacy. I hardly think you are in a position to comment, just now, you foolish girl. You are speaking from emotion and fear and ignorance, and not from knowledge. It ill becomes you, Hogwarts Head Girl, to be so careless."

After his tirade, she stared at the ground. He wondered if she was actually chastened by his angry comments.

Snape knew that pointing out her lack of knowledge was what finally reached her, calmed her somewhat. Her eyes gradually lifted, traveling up from his feet, pausing at the sickle slung in his belt, rising to the laces of the neck of the robe, up his throat, pausing a little too long at his mouth, and finally meeting his gaze.

"I saw all of it," she admitted. "From the moment you entered the circle. I was already here, inside. Your greetings, the -- the blood, and -- oh, from the sky -- the fire --" She paused, shaking her head as if she couldn't believe what she had seen. She was thinking, looking more like Hermione Granger, Hogwarts Head Girl, than she had in recent weeks, a return to her usual determined character. Her lips compressed, as if she were holding back a reluctant admission, and at last she said, "It was...powerful." She took a deep breath, squaring her shoulders. "I'd like you to teach me this. Can you teach me this?"

Snape was stunned, his anger absolutely drained away. The way I must be looking at her, he thought. It was powerful. Teach me this. The single most overwhelming thing she could have said to him at this moment. Overwhelming, alluring, and terrifying.

A new kind of student. A pupil of his own, in the way that he had belonged to Angharad. Someone to help him in his search, and a worthy pupil, at that. He blinked in the gathering dark. He swallowed.

"There are things we must discuss before we both agree to that request," he said now, thinking of the nature of some of the rites that might be performed. He gazed at her for a long moment before remembering. My ritual. The sunset wanes.

He turned quickly back to the altar stone, aware that she was following him, yet he could not bring himself to object. This particular ritual would not harm her in any way; and it was not as if she could leave the ring. The smell of the incense was stronger than he remembered it, as though the ring of energy surrounding them was concentrating the scent. The resinous fragrance of the amber seemed to fill his brain to the exclusion of all else save for the girl.

She came around the altar stone and stood facing him. "May I speak -- ask you questions -- while you're doing...your rites?" she whispered.

Snape frowned at her briefly. "Of course."

"I just meant, it seemed you were reciting from memory...perhaps there is a prescribed formula and you shouldn't deviate."

"Your question, Miss Granger."

"May I stand here?"

The fire was dying down. And with it, his cloak calmed. The ring of energy was still strong, but more densely focused in its whirling, as though it had made itself a path through the Stones and was following it rigidly. Snape was trembling, he was still so elated. The ritual had worked, and with the girl here, he knew why. Always before, when the power arose, there had been himself and Angharad. A point, and a counterpoint. In performing the ritual alone, he had lacked the balance that could bring the power and the Needfire into the Circle. He had stupidly overlooked it all this time, in his solitary arrogance.

"You may."

"There is no heat to this fire, sir?" She was holding out her hands. He was struck again by their puffiness, their redness, in the light of the Needfire.

"That is correct." Once the fire was out, he would rinse the altar with a small amount of the blessed water.

"Then how does it burn?"

"It does not burn. It..." he reached for the correct word. "It consumes."

"But not through heat." She appeared to be thinking deeply. Snape divided his attention between the fire on the stone, and her face, luminous in the last of the Needfire's eerie light. She will be a powerful witch, he thought. She is a powerful witch, already.

Around his ankles Snape could feel the pooled coldness receding, like a slow outbound tide. The girl was shivering, her arms crossed over her chest. The feathered cloak had settled enough to be handled, and he stepped to her side of the altar and placed it on her shoulders. It was too long for her, but it would keep her warm in her skimpy training clothing, now that she was no longer running. He still had his woolen robe.

The girl looked up at him in gratitude, her hands clutching at the cape, but then she released it and stared at her hands, holding them stiffly away from her body. "Take it off me," she said tightly.

"Why? You're cold."

"Take it off. I'm not clean, I can't touch it. It can't touch me."

"Ridiculous," he announced, and returned to his side of the altar stone. "Lumos. " He needed light to see, since the Needfire had gone out. He bent to blow away the ash from the stone.

There was a sob from the girl. "Please," she whimpered. "Please."

"In a moment, I'm busy. Besides, you're not dirty, you foolish girl." He felt cruel for pushing her so, but there seemed to be no other way to arrive at the source of the problem. It had been going on for weeks. He continued blowing softly on the stone, but looked up at her. "You might help," he said. "I want to clear the ash, then I will rinse the stone." Perhaps distracting her would be beneficial.

It did not help; she stood rigidly still. Snape finished clearing the stone, and then reached to unstopper his flask and rinse the top of the altar.

"Water for the new moon," he intoned deeply. The ritual was finished.

"Please..." the word was nothing but a small trembling.

Snape got to his feet. "Please what? I will not remove the cloak, you are chilled and will become ill. Stop this nonsense, Miss Granger."

Huge eyes turned up to his.

"Merlin," he spat. "Come here. I'll wash your hands for you, since you think they're so foul. Then you can wear the damned cloak and be warm." He showed her the flask of ritual water.

"That is only water," she objected.

"Sacred rain water," he corrected her. "Did you think I'd bring soap, expecting to find you here?"

"Whatever you say, Professor."

"I don't like your tone. You said you wanted to learn, so learn, Miss Granger. I gather this water from the trunks of hollow oaks with mistletoe in them. Oaks sacred to the Druids. Now stop blabbering and give me your hands." It is only water in a way, he thought, but she believed she needed cleansing, for some odd reason, and so cleanse her he would.

She met him halfway round the altar stone, her arms outstretched.

Snape slowly poured a thin stream of water over her right arm, beginning at the start of the redness midway of her forearm. He heard her hiss as the cold, slightly acidic water stung the scratches and welts. "Hold this." He put the flask into her free hand and gently rubbed the water across her raw skin with his palms and long fingers. "More," he told her. "Pour more water, here over my hands. Do it carefully."

The flask trembled in her fingers, but she poured, splashing a bit. He worked his way down her arm to her hands, taking care to smooth the soothing water over all her skin, each finger, her palm, her thumb. "This water is never to be wasted," he instructed as he worked. "Never poured on fallow ground. Give me your other hand. Yes. Now, pour again, start at your elbow. "

When next he looked at her face, his task complete, she was looking down at her clean hands, silent, weeping.


	7. Cogito Ergo Sum

"Do I stress you out  
My sweater is on backwards and inside out  
And you say how appropriate  
I don't want to dissect everything today  
I don't mean to pick you apart you see  
But I can't help it  
There I go jumping before the gunshot has gone off  
Slap me with a splintered ruler  
And it would knock me to the floor if I wasn't there already  
If only I could hunt the hunter  
  
And all I really want is some patience  
A way to calm the angry voice  
And all I really want is deliverance."  
  
\-- All I Really Want. Alanis Morissette.  
  
  
She was five years old, dressed in a stained tricot shirt. Donna had stopped at the bakery earlier that day, bringing home some hot, fragrant chocolate biscuits that made Hermione's mouth water. The scent reminded her of the Sugarplum Fairy's dance out of Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker Suite. Her father loved to play the album in the Granger's stereo system, making himself comfortable on his large, leather covered couch, his long, skilled surgeon-fingers tapping on the armrest in time with the music.  
  
There was some music now, pouring out of the house's wide, breathing windows; blue-eyed ornaments against the white, European calmness of the Granger's suburban cottage.  
  
Her five year old self was seated on the porch, where Donna sent her with a saucer with some biscuits in it. Her mother would rather have Hermione outside so as not to dirty the couches or make a mess in the kitchen, which somebody would have to clean later.  
  
She put a biscuit in her mouth, and closing her eyes, bit on the soft, sweet, crumbly pastry. Some leaves rustled as they swept along the street, carried on a summer wind that brushed a stray lock of hair from the place where she secured it. Hermione moved it back behind her ear, still chewing on this wonderful first bite, not wanting it ever to end. In front of her, an older boy - about ten or eleven - zigzagged the street on his rollerblades. Another gust of wind tussled his blond hair; carrying some more leaves along the Grangers' porch and caressing Hermione's ear like a hot, moistened mouth.  
  
It tickled, and she moved a little, away from the touch that was both pleasant and disturbing. It didn't stop, though, and a large finger, its tip slightly roughened, replaced the mouth, following the outline of the shell of Hermione's ear. It skimmed downward, gently caressing the delicate, childish line of her jaw; dwelling on the soft skin of her neck. There still was some toddler's fat underneath her chin, and a knuckle brushed the smooth, soft area before moving to her left shoulder. It stroked her arm: from bicep to elbow, moving on to tickle her forearm, where she was most ticklish aside from her ribs. At that it moved on; to her small hand, a larger version of a baby hand - or so it seemed - now covered with some sweet crumbs.  
  
Hermione tried to pull back her hand when her fingers were brought up, and the crumbs gently sucked off them; the tongue curling around her small fingers was big and wet and slobbery, like some disgusting water snake. But then, she knew it would soon be over, and the fingers would be back tickling her.  
  
Several seconds later, the wind gave a hearty laugh, after which Hermione had her hand back to herself. She had secretly wiped it off on the cloth of her cut-offs, frowning a little as the fingers reached for her shoulder. They were carefully twisting in the short sleeve of her shirt, pulling it away from the tender, white skin of her shoulder, sneaking to touch the smooth curve of her chest. She giggled, somehow unsure: while the touch was warm and ticklish and nice, it felt vaguely wrong, and Hermione was uncomfortable.  
  
Nevertheless, the fingers kept going. They moved lower now, probing gently, a finely trimmed nail scraping the highly sensitive tip of a childish breast. Its tiny, soft bud had erected at once, causing her to release another, stressed giggle. It tickled! She heard herself giggling, trying to detach herself from the fingers- from the embrace that tightened around her. Safe and gentle at first, the arms closed around her smallish figure, then more forcefully, until some moments later, the fingers began to probe through her flesh, plunging into her ribcage and not stopping until they reached her lungs.  
  
She breathed deeply, feeling the once tickling fingers uncorking her lungs, and with sharp, accurate movements, pumping all the air out of them until she choked. Her face was quickly purpling from lack of air, her eyes widening from the terror of being held against her will. She wanted out. Needed out, this very instant. But the darkness was descending, like a thick, gooey veil pulled over her eyelids, and she couldn't breathe, _couldn't fucking breathe_ …!  
  
Then she was awake and drinking air in fervent, feverish urgency. It was like Ambrosia, she thought, better than Ambrosia. It was cool, cleansing detergent pouring down her throat: it was oak's blessed water, running on her arid hands. She could hear herself panting; her chest rising and falling under the thick blanket. Crookshanks, curled into a ball at her feet, opened one yellow eye and looked at her with sleepy annoyance.  
  
"Go back to sleep, Crook," she told him. "Nothing interesting here for you."  
  
The tom, which had been awoken by the commotion, dropped back into the mattress, turning his back to his mistress. She supposed it was Crook's way of telling her he never even considered giving up so much as a minute of his beauty sleep due to her silliness.  
  
"Fat, lazy orange good-for-nothing hairball," Hermione muttered.  
  
 _Go back to sleep_ , the cat's back seemed to transmit.  
  
 _Great, so now not only did I give the best head Ronald Weasley ever had_ , Hermione thought sarcastically, _I'm also reading cats' minds_. In the dead of the night - secured in a room located in an ancient, magical castle - the notion almost seemed less surrealistic than it should have seemed. Or better yet; the surrealism of the vision was almost swallowed by the surrealism of the background. No point in being crazy in a world where craziness is the definition for normalcy, Hermione found herself musing. She began to pull off the covers with the intention to go to the small bathroom, annoyed to find her limbs covered with a thin film of sweat. Perhaps she might just take a full shower, instead of simply washing her hands-  
  
 _No! You cannot, you shall not!_ Heaving, she sank back into the tumbled covers, lifting her hands in the dark until they were washed in the moonlight slanting from the arched window. It was the same waxing, crooked-smile moon that had watched down on her as Professor Snape- Druid Snape… Whoever-Snape poured the oak's blessed water over her hands, and somehow cleansed them - somehow sanctified them by this simple act. He had hardly looked at her as he bathed her hands- he was just… mean, petty, sexy old Snape, in his pure-white, exiled-Baroness feathered cloak, and maybe it was his lack of reaction that finally allowed some hidden cord inside of her to snap. Maybe the fact that along with his cool, detached mannerism he was still honest with her: had shared something with her, which he had shared - Hermione was relatively sure - with no one else. It made them, on some level, equals. He was forced to trust her with his secret, and so, she could trust him with the pain she could not seem to stop.  
  
 _Do you know, Snape,_ she found herself thinking, _what it is that you do for me?_  
  
The moon, his Arianrhod, wove silken threads into his raven black hair, which glinted against the dark. Arianrhod was shimmering in the tears that shone in her eyes; simmering deep in her soul and bubbling upward so they could pour - like molten blood or ice-cold fear - down her cheeks. As always, Hermione was fascinated with the contrast Snape's black locks created with the pallor of his skin- only now, things were different. He was cleansing her hands for her, and inside, her heart was breaking or healing, or healing only to be broken again: it felt like falling in love.  
  
By the time Snape was through, she had been crying quietly. It was not the water- cool and sweet as it was, sliding down her sore hands. This was only damn water, and she told him so. It was the fact he that noticed, and cared- it was having his dark, lucid black gaze resting on her upturned palms as she outstretched them to be cleansed; it was the fact that he made up a way to revive her out of her misery - it was having his eyes trailing along the curves of her now-washed hands, determining they were cleansed. And therefore, they were cleansed. He was destroying her.  
  
Unable to take any more of the emotional stress, Hermione had asked the man she was now carefully training herself to think of as her mentor, to leave the Stones, now that the whirling ring of energy had abated. Snape, as she expected, had insisted on walking her back to Hogwarts, noting that it was already dark outside. While that was true, she felt it was irrelevant.  
  
Knowing the exchange ahead of her would serve to determine certain ground rules in whatever kind of apprenticeship she might be taking upon herself in the future, Hermione chose her words carefully. "It is dark-" she began, "and I do not underestimate the possible danger. However, I know the extent of my… ability, and I believe I am capable of reaching the castle without being harmed-"  
  
"Bragging, are we?"  
  
Hermione glared at him. "Being objective, Professor. Which isn't the point anyway. Point is: I need my space, and I need it now." She took a calming breath. "I don't mean to sound disrespectful. I'm sorry, but that's how things are for me. I don't make it a hobby running in the dark-" Snape gave her a dubious look, "whatever you might think; nonetheless… this was just- too much. You can watch me from the shadows or whatever it is that you do, if you like, if you're worried," she added, nervously picking invisible lint from her sweatshirt. Pressure was building inside of her, like a warm, murky wave of acidic nausea. _Desperation was tepid_ , Hermione decided. _Neither warm, nor cold_. "I must go," she continued. Her voice was shaking, and she wanted to be able to look him in the eyes, cast the wire barb of her fishhook and snag his full attention- but then that was a trick saved for girls: girls like Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil. This was not the way Hermione Granger acted, angling for a man's attention; angling for a man's permission through lewd, feminine tactics. She didn't need his attention, nor did she need his permission to come and go as she pleased. _No- I might be childish and foolish, but I am surely clever and independent enough to know your mere permission and approval would never form a cage to hold me. It's your recognition I seek; funny, isn't it, that I'm contemplating to yield to it before you even offered- hell with it, I must go, must be away from you_ \- "Now."  
  
Her defiance seemed to… Hermione wasn't sure. Annoy him, yes, but annoyance just seemed like Snape's default reaction. Amuse him, perhaps? She decided she'd have to be satisfied with that trace of a smirk hovering about his ugly, fey features.  
  
"Goodbye, Professor," she said shortly. Then, turning her back on… Whoever Snape, Hermione began making her way towards Hogwarts castle.  
  
She had not gone far before his deep voice stopped her yet again. "Miss Granger."  
  
She turned, looking at him as he stood, pale and strangely luminous in the light from his wand, the ugly guardian of his Circle. "Yes?"  
  
"The words to open the classroom wards are _Cogito ergo sum_. Kindly leave my cloak on my desk when you reach the castle."  
  
Hermione blinked. "I read Kant," she mumbled, unsure as to what drove her to say it.  
  
Once again, she thought she had seen a trace of a smile on Snape's face. "Keep reading Kant," he told her.  
  
"I will." With a nod, she drew the cloak a little closer around her, and began to jog, lightly, towards the Castle, picking up speed as she left him, and his frightening, fascinating Circle, behind.  
  
The white, beautiful feathered cloak was now descending from the clothes hanger- a few centimeters away from the moonbeams ' reach. The moonlight, however, that poured between her fingers like honey, did wash the heavy tome of Kant's work. The book rested in its usual place on the night table, carefully placed to parallel the furniture's sharp angles. A Druid cloak, a philosophy book; no gun, but her wand rested underneath her pillow, and her sore, reddened hand would roam there at night, to grasp it as if it was some kind of umbilical cord attaching her to reality - pulling her back from a nightmare.  
  
Attentive to the moonbeams' silent play along the covers, Hermione snuck back under the quilt. The warm, heavy lump that was Crookshanks rose up sleepily as she stirred him with her feet, then resettled himself at the small of her back, curling against his mistress. _Go to sleep, the cat vibrated. Shish, you're noisy. And it's not you reading my mind, it's me reading yours. I'm a cat- we were worshipped back there in Egypt. My mind is way too complex for you to read - mere human that you are. Off to sleep with you now, pet. Sleep tight_.  
  


* * *

  
  
She sat in the common room, reading. Kant and the Ancient Runes text had been temporarily abandoned in favour of Descartes' 'Principia Philosophiae', which she had borrowed from Mandy Brocklehurst. The tall, stern looking Ravenclaw girl - who matched Hermione in her fierceness and determination - was someone she could sometimes talk to about the things Harry and Ron considered too boring to discuss: school, magical theory, philosophy and the likes. The two young women made it a habit to lend and borrow books from each other, and so, when looking for a certain author she wasn't likely to find in the Hogwarts library, Mandy was the first person Hermione approached, knowing there was a probable chance the other witch might have what she was looking for.  
  
At the moment, Hermione was wrapped in her own fleece shawl of bliss. A cup of her favourite strong tea was placed exactly on top of the magic circle, outlined on the palm-like saucer on which it was standing. There was a certain crankiness, as well as a certain soreness, lurking at the back of her mind- like a stained, sticky finger looking for loose ends it could untie even further. Nevertheless, the newly found sense of cleanness - _of sanity_ \- gained the other night, strengthened the complex weave that was her cognition, and made her feel more like herself than she felt in a long, long time.  
  
It was then that Harry landed on the loveseat sofa beside her, wild hair dripping water: fresh from the shower after a Quidditch practice. "How do you do, love?"  
  
"How do you do, Harry? And I would appreciate it if you gave up the endearments."  
  
"Of course, love."  
  
Hermione rolled her eyes, almost surprised at herself to notice she was doing it affectionately, bookmarked 'Principia Philosophiae' and gently put it aside. "Where is your Siamese twin?"  
  
Harry gave her an enigmatic look. "You know Loony Lovegood has been after him since fifth year, now don't you?"  
  
"You shouldn't use that horrible nickname, Harry."  
  
"Calm down. I like Luna. It's only a pet name for her, all right?" He was making a face again. "Now stop being an idiot and listen to me, would'ya?"  
  
"Very well."  
  
Harry gave her s stern look. "So Luna likes Ron. A lot. And he doesn't seem to be so… opposed to her lately… seeing you left him rather… deprived."  
  
She grew attentive at once. "What exactly do you mean by 'not so opposed'?"  
  
"Just what you heard-" Harry almost sounded defensive. "Well, actually, that he's being nice to her, okay?"  
  
"The bitch. No, no, I'm being irrational… I knew she liked Ron, there's nothing new about that." Hermione breathed deeply, taking a moment to consider what Harry had just told her. "So Ron plans on cheating on me?"  
  
"Don't be ridiculous," Harry fended. "I'm just saying that whatever it is you do, you're doing, it's driving you two apart."  
  
"Well, well. Now didn't I know that?"  
  
"I didn't mean to taunt you."  
  
"No, just attempting to protect your best friend's interests. It's okay, Harry, I can see what it is that you're trying to do, it's only that I…" she quieted for a moment, contemplating her words. "Perhaps I'm selfish, I probably am, but I have more than Ron's best interests in mind at the moment…it's probably the last thing I think of nowadays. It has been… a difficult time, for a variety of reasons, and it was cruel and selfish of me to allow Ron to get hurt, and yet- I'm sick of hearing about Ron from you, okay?"  
  
Harry mouth twisted in a crooked smile. "Do you really think I came here to speak to you on Ron's behalf?"  
  
"Well, it definitely sounds like you did," she answered coolly.  
  
The messy haired boy shrugged his shoulders sadly. "A knot in the tongue Potter," he said. "Bollocks. I'm sorry if I let it sound as if I was only talking to you because of Ron. You're my friend too, you know. I care for you like I care for Ron. I was worried about you."  
  
It was Hermione's turn to shrug her shoulders. "It's fine, Harry. I guess I am… very likely to be… mistaking people's genuine intentions lately."  
  
"What is it with you, really?" Harry asked. He looked at her with sincere worry in his beautiful, green eyes, and she could almost see her own anxiety reflected in their swirling, restless depths. "I know you're not okay," he added. "You should stop pushing me off."  
  
"The moment you tell me about your mysterious lover," Hermione answered, "I'll tell you about my problems."  
  
"It's complicated," he said quietly, a tinge of tiredness creeping in to dim his voice. "I'd tell myself it's just sex and be done thinking of it."  
  
"So it isn't just sex."  
  
Harry gave her an amused glance. "It is. Sex is simple, so it is. Your turn now."  
  
Hermione opened her mouth to protest, and then realized Harry had indeed just shared something with her, as meager as the information might have been. "I think I'm better off without Ron," she said at last. "And Ron is better off without me."  
  
"Is Ron causing your problems?"  
  
"No, no," she hurried to say. "It's only… I think we've grown apart, and while I think I discovered- something that might… promote me mentally and perhaps, well, there are several ideas I'm playing with at the moment concerning the fight - I promise to share them with you the moment I'm walking on more solid theoretical ground - Ron and I… are simply holding each other off. Can you see what I mean?"  
  
Harry nodded slowly. "I think I can. I think you should tell him so. He's confused, Hermione, and he's hurting. I don't think that's what you want- to hurt him."  
  
She blushed, ashamed of herself. "You're right. I'll try to talk to him… sometime soon."  
  
"Good." Harry gave her a little smile: it might not be completely happy, but it was at least genuine. "I think I'll be going now."  
  
"Enough 'not-company' for one evening?" Hermione teased.  
  
"That's not… incorrect," he said quietly. "I grew up rather alone, you know. I love to have people around me- all the time, in fact. When there's no one I suddenly feel… lonely. Like there's no one else in the universe and I'm all alone in the cupboard under the staircase again. But really talking to someone - it's, well - you see… that's a lot. It almost makes me need to go back into the cupboard, if only for a little while."  
  
She swallowed. "You'll be back, right?"  
  
"Sure, love," Harry answered, shrugging off the almost surreal, fey expression that shrouded his doll-like face. "Talk to you!"  
  
"Goodbye, Harry."  
  
She watched him leave, weak, all of a sudden, to have something resembling empathy gently nibbling on her high defensive walls and forcing her to give in a little. Disturbed, Hermione reached for the book, lifting the saucer with the not-yet empty tea cup, and left the Gryffindor common room.  
  
She did some Yoga, and then, once her muscles were warm, let herself indulge in half an hour of anaerobic exercise. It was almost as if she was attempting to check whether the sweat and smell following the physical exercise would erase the sense of cleanliness that kept surrounding her like a halo ever since yesterday night. After the exercise, she showered, stupidly relieved to find that the urge to scrape every piece of skin was subdued: enough so she could master it instead of giving in to it.  
  


* * *

  
  
Three days later, some time after dinner was over, Hermione had neatly folded the beautiful feathered cloak under a clean school robe, and securing her bookbag, made the way to the Slytherin dungeons with the intention of returning Snape his cloak. Strangely enough, the sense of cleanliness - although considerably dulled by now - had lasted so far.  
  
As it turned out, she had no need of the password. Snape, as it happened, was still at the classroom at that time of the day, marking essays, or whatever it is he did with the always present pile of parchments that rested on his broad wooden desk.  
  
"I read Descartes," Hermione found herself blurting upon entering the classroom. Embarrassed at her own slip - sure the Potions Master would probably take it as showing off or an attempt to please him - she blushed furiously.  
  
Snape, however, did not respond.  
  
Aroused into reaction by the lack of any from him, Hermione moistened her lips. "Won't you ask me what I thought?"  
  
At last, he lifted his eyes to look at her. "What have you read of Descartes'?"  
  
She told him.  
  
"I'd like you to read 'Le Monde', especially 'La Géométrie'," Snape said dryly. "And some of Leibniz's criticism on Descartes' work."  
  
Hermione frowned. "Is that what you'll be teaching me?"  
  
"Unless you wish to tell me what I should teach to you?" he mocked her.  
  
Her cheeks flushed even a brighter rose. "I was lucky enough to be able to borrow 'Principia Philosophiae' from a friend, but I don't see where-"  
  
"I'll lend it to you," he cut across her. "Along with another book I'd like you to read- assuming you are still interested in an apprenticeship?"  
  
She answered him with a bold, daring gaze. "I am."  
  
"Very well. Come, then." Snape rose to his feet: his longish, towering figure all dressed in black: like the shadows that moved along but were never quite able to touch the white clad man she remembered from yesterday. _But shadows are not substance,_ she remembered. _Only the lack of light. Terry Pratchett had put it best by letting the Disc World's scientists do their calculations according to the speed of Darkness: it shies away from light more quickly than light arrives from point A to point B. My own twisted sense of reality has shied off from that man and has been corrected for fear of him. How odd, how odd_.  
  
Silently, she followed Snape into his office: the back of the storeroom, it seemed, opened with the murmur of a password ("existence takes precedence over essence" - how unsurprising). The secret opening led to a surprisingly cozy dungeon room, with a currently inactive fireplace at one end, and a large, antique desk at the other. The room was decorated in dark, Slytherin green, its wall covered books, all of them carefully kept behind glass. Eager to reach for these treasures and yet knowing she mustn't, Hermione forced herself to remain rooted on the spot, watching Snape as he reached for one of the cabinets, pulling a leather bound volume out of it and dusting it lightly. He handed it to Hermione, who caressed the beautifully crafted leather binding with the tips of her fingers. _'Le Monde'_ , it read.  
  
Snape didn't wait to watch her reaction, but reached for another shelf, this time drawing a heavier, larger, ancient-looking tome. There was no gold rimming the pages' tips, she noticed, nor was the cover adorned with silver or gold leaves. It was simple looking, its binding worn-out with age; stroked into glittering dimness by many hands who handled it lovingly for generations. Hermione's eyes narrowed, and she noted the extreme care with which her Potions Professor was offering her the book. Swallowing, she put _'Le Monde'_ in her schoolbag, and stretched her arm to take the volume Snape was extending. His fingers were milky-white against the earth-brown of the leather: perhaps it was its brownness, its earthiness that made the contrast bearable. Welcome instead of piercing. Not black against white, but two nature-associated colours: not the bluish, lovely white against the opaque black.  
  
A muscle in her temple quivered, and she trembled as their fingers brushed when she took the book in her hands. Cool, white and fresh were his hand, Hermione thought. Like the petals of a rose.  
  
"I believe we had a bargain?" Snape's voice wakened her from her short reverie.  
  
"A bargain?"  
  
"I lend you the books; you give me back my cloak."  
  
"Yes, of course." She had carefully unbundled the cloak, returning it to its rightful owner.  
  
Snape kept his usual demeanor: his reaction, she determined, tended to show only toward the negative side of the scale. Aside from a bit of cynical amusement, he had so far demonstrated no gratitude, elation or happiness. Hermione wondered whether she was masochistic for considering even hypothetically how much she would be ready to sacrifice in order to be able to put a genuine smile in his eyes. "What is this book?"  
  
"Druidism, and the Druid ritual. Written by one of our own many years ago, and handed up through the generations. Read it. Consider what you read. And think it over carefully. Think carefully why it is you wish to learn. I want you to be able to make your own decisions concerning the apprenticeship. It should be based on accurate information of the rites you will be performing and the knowledge you will acquire."  
  
She nodded. The magic seemed to break, or intensify into reality. It did not matter. Her fingers still remembered the touch of his hand, and burned with it. Hermione raised her eyes, to look at her teacher.  
  
"That will be it," Snape said. "You may go now."


	8. A New Kind of Student

_lily has a rose  
(i have none)  
"don't cry dear violet"  
  
"o how how how  
could i ever wear it now  
when the boy who gave it to  
you is the tallest of the boys"  
  
"he'll give me another  
if I let him kiss me twice  
but my lover has a brother  
who is good and kind to all"  
  
"o no no no  
let the roses come and go  
for kindness and goodness do  
not make a fellow tall"  
  
lily has a rose  
no rose i've  
and losing's less than winning(but  
love is more than love)  
  
\-- e.e.cummings_  
  
  
  
Once again, after the new moon ritual, Snape found it difficult to re-enter his real life. This time it was because of the elation, the glory, of having awakened his Circle. All due to the presence of Hermione Granger, the counter-balance in the scale, yin to his yang, female to his male. He felt taller, more diamond-hard, more focused than ever, and more determined to study the Circle and druidism than ever before. But first he needed to speak to Miss Granger and clearly explain to her what a druidic apprenticeship could mean. It was at odds with his position as Potions Master of Hogwarts, and he must think very, very hard before proceeding. Above all, he must be clear with her.  
  
 _Angharad, to a mildly shocked Severus, seated in their own small circle somewhere in Oxfordshire, summer.  
  
"Yes, I'm naked. And so should you be."  
  
"But. Angharad. I."  
  
"You. What? Speechless at last?" said with a small smile. "It is mid-summer, we are to celebrate the fertility rite. Do you recall from your studies what that means? Or did you skip over that part of the book, Severus?"  
  
He knew that she saw him gulping. He had indeed skipped the reading, and so was unprepared. Her white robes were draped over the secondary altar. She approached him, oddly beautiful still, though with a certain softness of flesh. Experienced flesh, he thought to himself. He looked up at her face, lined, careworn; her hands, knotted and gnarled knuckles, reminding him of the burls on the sacred and ancient oaks. I am childish. Am I truly seeking knowledge, or am I seeking nothing but sensation? Am I so shallow? Would I reject this woman because of a certain droop of breast, a softness of belly? The external badges of wisdom?  
  
I am not so shallow, he thought. He rose, unworking the knots of his belt and sandals, and at last, unwrapping the long cloth that covered his hips. He placed the garments with hers, draped across the stone, the sandals on top. After her words and the slow undressing, he was ready for her.  
  
She looked at him with a small smile again. "My sweet apprentice. Come, celebrate. Be my lover, be the god incarnate, make the goddess young again."  
  
Severus took her in his arms. She was warmer even than the night. "Be my goddess," he whispered.  
  
The Stones' power rose higher, humming, as they joined. Her feathered cloak tried to fly in the swirling of power, but could not, held to earth by his clothing and sandals. He cried out, seemingly flying himself, enraptured. Angharad. His mentor. His goddess._  
  


~*~

  
  
For the next couple of nights Snape prowled the corridors again, looking for Weasley and Granger. He told himself it was because he wanted to see for himself that she was all right, remind her to return his cloak, talk to her about the apprenticeship, ask her about her reactions to the ritual and the power of the Stones. In the end, he knew he would not find her again. She would not be looking at him over the shoulder of her young giant. They were not stupid enough to be caught out twice.  
  
He didn't find that particular pair; but there was another, equally interesting, lurking in the Slytherin corridors not far from his dungeon as he returned to his quarters. He was walking slowly, silently, musing on what could make a young woman wound herself. What about her was so vile, so unwholesome, that her own hands, her own arms, her skin, must be punished?  
  
And again, as on the night he caught Weasley and Granger, the torchlight gleamed on sleek young hair; blond, this time, dipping to a dark head, palms against the wall, elbows bent, creating a cage -- or a shelter -- for the creature pressed betwixt him and the corridor wall.  
  
Malfoy. Not an uncommon sight in the Slytherin halls; the young man was as randy as a stoat.  
  
 _Or a Weasel. Stop it, Snape._  
  
And who was he trapping this night? Snape paused in the shadows, curious. Malfoy's latest victim was held face to the wall, arms above the head, something that glinted held in one hand, with the blond's body tight against her. Or him. Malfoy made little distinction in partners, like his father. Sex was sex, after all.  
  
"Harder. Kiss me harder there." _Do I recognize that voice? I do._  
  
Malfoy's crystal chuckle was soft and he pressed closer with his hips, drawing a groan from his partner. "Any harder and it will leave a mark."  
  
"Mark me, then." A quiet voice, breaking a little, passionate.  
  
"I've already marked you there." A slow, sweet grind of his hips, another chuckle.  
  
" _Merlin, Draco_...Then do it again. Don't let it fade."  
  
A dark head emerged past Malfoy's shoulder, as the partner twisted to be face to face. Malfoy's mouth lowered to his lover's neck and fastened there.  
  
Once again, eyes opened over a shoulder and seemed to stare into Snape's. He flinched back, startled, before realizing that the faint glitter he now saw low down on Malfoy's back, was a hand, holding eyeglasses.  
  
Lily Evans' eyes, languorous and aroused, looked at Snape blindly, myopic, over Malfoy's shoulder.  
  
" _Let me kiss you, Lily."  
  
"Why?" A tiny smirk at the corner of her lips. She knew the power she had, he thought.  
  
"Why not?"  
  
"Severus. Use your brain." Lily began ticking reasons on her fingers. "We'll be caught. It's late, we should be in our Houses. We've been talking for too long."  
  
"I love our conversations." He cut across her objections. "One kiss," Severus drawled. "How long can it take? And do you really care if we're caught?" He was moving in close, not really inclined to let her say "no."  
  
"Only one?"  
  
"I promise."  
  
"One, then." And as he went to kiss her, she stopped him with two fingers on his lips. "Our first, so make it good, Severus."  
  
And she turned up her mouth, eager. Severus leaned in. Only one kiss, but she had not specified how long it could last, and technically, he'd asked her that very question. Slytherin that he was, he'd created his own loophole, and smiled as he touched her mouth with his.  
  
Long moments later, still kissing, her hands clutched the front of his robe. His knees were trembling, and when he put his arms around her she did not object. She herself stepped closer, tilting her head so that his mouth slanted across hers with increasing passion.  
  
Their first kiss. Sweet, hot. Like his first taste of crystallized ginger, dense with spice, sticky with sugar, an incredible mélange.  
  
When Lily's palms flattened against his chest, Severus slowly lifted his head. Her eyes glowed up at him, beautiful, grass-green rim around bottomless pupil.  
  
"Goodnight," she whispered to him.  
  
"A good kiss?" Seventeen. Such a deep-seated need for validation.  
  
"Moderate," she laughed at his consternation. "We'll practice." They were near the Gryffindor corridors. Severus walked her as far as he dared -- Slytherins didn't visit Gryffindors, not without repercussions -- and saw her through the portrait hole, the swing of her dark red hair on her back leaving him dry-mouthed._  
  
Malfoy.  
  
And Potter, of all partners.  
  
Snape could not help but wonder what James Potter's reaction would have been to discovering his son had taken another boy for a lover, and a Slytherin boy at that. The thought of James' reaction made his mouth curl into a sneer. _Dear James. You took Lily from me. And now Slytherin House has caught your boy, it appears._  
  
Snape blinked, returning to himself, and retreated. He took the long way round to his quarters. He could not have explained his own mercy; passing up a chance to take more points from Gryffindor, unless it was for Lily's sake, Lily's boy in the arms of Malfoy, wicked serpent prince that the blond was, or perhaps it was the shock of the two youths, enemies for years and now tightly entwined, suddenly shifting his paradigm.  
  
~*~  
  
At breakfast the next morning, Snape found himself watching two tables, instead of his usual none. Slytherin, where Malfoy preened and pouted at the girls next to him. And Gryffindor, where the trio was seated as usual, Granger between her bookends. However, something was new there. Weasley's arm was not draped on her. She had removed it herself, twice, gently, and then with a hard elbow to Weasley's ribs the third time it crept back. Snape had been watching, covertly, and was mightily pleased with her.  
  
"Trouble in paradise," said Minerva now, sectioning her grapefruit. Snape's lip curled; he was not fond of grapefruit, and frequently Minerva managed to angle her spoon just so, and the fruit would spit in his direction. He shielded his porridge with his bent arm, elbow rudely on the table, changing hands to eat with the hand away from Minerva.  
  
"Meaning what, exactly?"  
  
She gestured with the serrated tip of the grapefruit spoon. "Miss Granger, Mr Weasley. Not so close any longer."  
  
Snape stifled his reaction at that comment, already wondering if Minerva had noticed his staring. Granger, less attached to Weasley. A good thing, in his opinion, and to Snape's personal benefit. He had ulterior motives.  
  
"Then I suppose that means Gryffindor will retain at least a few points," he said smugly. "One fewer couple doing what couples do."  
  
She slid him a glance. "Twenty points. It still stings, Severus."  
  
He closed his eyes and breathed deeply. "It's done, however."  
  
Flitwick interrupted. "It certainly is. Let's not go back over old ground."  
  
Minerva and Snape both looked at him, then at each other. Minerva's wicked three-cornered smile appeared again. "Want to go for five broken teacups this morning, Severus?"  
  
Snape almost smiled. Almost. There were times when she was as wicked as he, and he liked her for it.  
  
Flitwick's wand quivered, and Minerva's long, greying hair crawled out of its bun, hairpins tinkling on the table, landing in her grapefruit and her teacup. Snape stifled a snort at Flitwick's prank, finished his porridge, and headed to the dungeon for his First Year Potions class.  
  


~*~

  
  
Later that day, Snape was in his office, leafing slowly through Angharad's book, the one she gave him to study when she took him as her apprentice. Its leather cover had the dull patina of years of use, of much handling.  
  
He turned to the pages detailing the rite for Samhain. Would it be clear enough to help Hermione Granger in making her decision? He read slowly, the way he had not read, all those years ago when Angharad surprised him at mid-summer, naked in their circle, waiting for him to unite with her sexually to perform the rite. He had let her down because he wasn't prepared, but in the end all had come clear. It had been perfection.  
  
Snape closed his eyes, remembering the whirling, the vortex of force that rose as he made slow and careful love to his mentor. She had clutched at him, urging him on, faster, harder, but he was afraid he would hurt her. She was older, fragile. In the end she had whispered just one word to him, and it made all the difference.  
  
" _Celebrate._ "  
  
He smiled to himself and opened his eyes. They had celebrated, once, and then again. He looked back at the book, studying the description, and the small illustration. It was clear; and a bright student like Hermione Granger would understand, but the choice must be hers.  
  
Snape knew what decision he wanted her to make. His Circle had come alive with her there, in nearly the same way something in him had come to life all those nights ago, when he found her in the corridor with Weasley. But again: it would be her choice, and hers alone, and he would not influence her. Regardless of the pictures he could still see when he closed his eyes, if he thought very much at all. His one true concern was her mental state: those damaged hands of hers haunted him very nearly as much as her eyes. _And let's not forget, Snape...those dentist parents and Hogwarts Headmaster would not be likely to approve of this. But, oh -- to teach her as I was taught, and to watch her call down the Needfire, and finally share these things with another._  
  
He shelved the book carefully and returned to his lab to grade potions from the morning first-year's class. He knew they were all foul; but they all required review. And after that, of course, punishment essays.  
  
Snape was seated at his lab desk when the door opened and Hermione Granger entered, her arms wrapped around her schoolbag, and a cloth bundle. He looked up attentively; perhaps she was returning his cloak. He hadn't liked it being out of his possession for so long; the risk of exposure was too great. He rose and beckoned her into his office. Snape knew she heard his password to his office and he reminded himself that at some point he must change it. But not right away. Not until she had made her decision.  
  
Her reaction, upon entering his inner sanctum -- where, upon surprised reflection, he realized she had never been before -- was to be drawn as if by a magnet towards the glassed-in bookcases. He knew she was a bookworm; Madame Pince had often complained that it was as well there was a limit on the number of books a student could borrow, or eventually they'd simply have had to give Granger a dormitory room in the library itself.  
  
But after just the one longing step, Granger stopped, governing herself, and waited, clutching the bundle. Snape went to the shelf where he kept _Le Monde_ , and lifted it down. More than one purpose here: he would hold out the book to her, and she must expose those hands of hers in order to take it. _If there's been no improvement, I will not..._ The thought came reluctantly, slowly, grudgingly: _I will rescind the apprenticeship offer. Let there have been improvement._  
  
She put her bundle down to accept _Le Monde_. And as she tucked the volume inside her schoolbag, he noted that her hands seemed less raw. He wanted a closer look, and turned back to the shelf for Angharad's book. Snape held it out to her, holding it gently by the edges, the book lying against his forearms. He saw her hands tremble as she took the old book. They do look better. He let the book go somewhat reluctantly, allowing her to tug it away from him, her fingers brushing his as she gripped it. _Angharad, am I doing the right thing? It feels right. But there are obstacles. Minerva. Guide me._  
  
There was a moment of fumbling as he reminded her about his cloak. Hermione -- _Miss Granger_ , he reminded himself, harshly -- unbundled it and returned it. It appeared none the worse for its time in the Head Girl's room, and he draped it carefully over his office chair.  
  
"What is this book?" she asked now. She was handling it carefully, giving it respect, yet still caressing the old, old leather.  
  
"Druidism, and the druid rituals. Written by one of our own many years ago, and handed up through the generations. Read it. Consider what you read. And think it over carefully. Think carefully why it is you wish to learn. I want you to be able to make your own decisions concerning the apprenticeship. It should be based on accurate information of the rites you will be performing and the knowledge you will acquire." He looked at her sternly, but she only nodded.  
  
"That will be it. You may go now."  
  
After she was gone Snape was restless. He'd been immured in this prison long enough, lately, and was heartily sick of substandard student potions and execrable essays. There was not even any wish to prowl the corridors for points to deduct. He took some Floo powder from a small casket on the mantel, and tossed it into his cold fireplace. "The Three Broomsticks," he said, and stepped inside.  
  
It was a quiet night in the pub, for which he was grateful. A few patrons nursed drinks near the fireplace where he stepped out. Rosmerta saw him, arched an eyebrow at him, and he nodded. His regular, yes. Stolichnaya, chilled, thank you. Rosmerta brought him the drink as he settled in a corner far from the door, his back to the wall, not far from the Floo. Death Eater training never quite faded. _Always protect your back, know all your exits. Thank you, Lucius._  
  
He sipped at the vodka, watching with some interest and some vague concern as a woman detached herself from the bar and moved slowly towards him. She looked familiar. Dark hair, a slight wave to it; blue eyes. High cheekbones, a bit flushed with liquor.  
  
"Professor Snape. Of all people."  
  
"Yes."  
  
"How nice to see you again. Do you remember me?"  
  
"Your face is familiar, I admit. A former student, perhaps?"  
  
A slight smile. "May I join you?"  
  
He gestured to the chair across the table. "Please." This could be interesting. And then he had her name as she turned briefly in profile. Dark head, bent in concentration over a cauldron; a better student from nearly ten years ago. Marina Lewis. "Miss Lewis," he said. She was pleased that he remembered, he saw. Her flush deepened. "What are you drinking?"  
  
"Just firewhiskey."  
  
Snape caught Rosmerta's eye and requested a drink for his table companion. They were silent until it arrived. Snape could feel a certain tension stretching between them. She wanted something from him, and if he was right...it would not be unwelcome to give her what she wanted.  
  
But first of course, small talk. How he hated it. "What have you been doing since you left Hogwarts?" he asked.  
  
"I went into potions brewing, actually," Marina replied. Her fingers trailed up and down the dimples in her small glass. _Oh, yes. A clear signal._ He took a larger sip of his drink. The sooner his own glass was empty, the sooner they could move on. "It seems so mundane, but I've been moderately successful with various cleaning solutions for a number of things."  
  
"Worthwhile," he said now. "You were a fair student."  
  
She tossed her head. "More than fair, Professor Snape."  
  
He allowed himself a small smile. "Yes, I suppose so."  
  
"The great Snape, unbending?" She sipped, but not much.  
  
"Why not? I am, after all, outside my dungeon." He sipped again; half gone.  
  
"Indeed." He watched her take a deep breath, and then the plunge. It was humorous. "I had a crush on you, you know."  
  
"Really." He hadn't known. Some of his students did develop fascinations; it was peculiar to him. "You hid it well." He took the next step in this stupid dance, and stretched his hand out on the table near his glass, palm down. She looked at his fingers, and then up at his face. "Are you still crushing?" he asked now. Her eyes flicked to his and he allowed himself yet another small smile. _Careful, Snape. Your face may crack._  
  
Her hand nudged his, fingertip to fingertip. "Shamefully, yes," she admitted. "I saw you come in and...well, ten years just vanished, and here I am, staring at the Potions Master like a lovesick owl. It's so stupid."  
  
"Hardly that." He tossed back his vodka. She was watching the muscles of his throat, and he was pleased. "Have you moved here to Hogsmeade?"  
  
"Yes, actually. A month ago, to be closer to work."  
  
"Enjoying it?"  
  
"Quite." Her fingers twitched alongside his.  
  
"Miss Lewis." _Get to the bloody point._  
  
"Marina."  
  
"Marina. Would you like another drink?"  
  
"I haven't finished this one."  
  
"But I've finished mine."  
  
"Do you have somewhere you must be this evening?"  
  
"Not particularly, though I should be grading punishment essays."  
  
She laughed at that, and he liked her laugh. "How I hated those." She flicked her lashes down, and then up again. "But you never gave me detention, in all those years."  
  
"How ever did you escape." _Ah yes, here we are. The fascination._  
  
"Not a failed potion in the bunch, I suppose."  
  
 _She's fishing for your approval. She wants **you** to pounce, Snape_. He moved his fingers against hers and turned his palm up on the table. "Would you like a detention now, Marina? Is that why you're here talking with Hogwarts' own resident evil professor?"  
  
Snape saw a flush move up her throat. _Too direct?_ She swallowed. She knocked back the rest of her firewhiskey.  
  
"Now that you mention it...yes, Professor Snape, I would, rather." And when he laughed, she smiled, and placed her hand in his. A nice smile.  
  


~*~

  
  
Marina's flat was small, but thankfully clean and orderly. Snape was relieved; he could not abide untidiness.  
  
There was no preamble. After she locked the door behind him, her hands were at his shoulders, removing his robes. She hung them up for him in the coat closet with her own, and then took his hand and led him to her bedroom. She turned to face him, and he pulled her into his arms, bending his head, taking her mouth.  
  
She was aggressive, and in a hurry, he thought. Within moments her wand was out, and she had charmed their clothing away. She backed him towards her bed, and when his knees hit, she pushed him down.  
  
"In a hurry?" he asked her, almost laughing. Almost.  
  
"Yes," she muttered. Her hair swung down on either side of his face as she bent to him, tongue flickering.  
  
"Why?" He spoke against her mouth, his hands sliding up the outside of her thighs as she half lay upon him. She gave a great shiver.  
  
"Gods, your hands. Always the sexiest thing about you, Professor. Except for your voice."  
  
 _Lily, naked above him, squirming, as he tickled her. "Stop that." And then a moment later, "No...don't stop." Laughing. "I changed my mind, Severus. As usual." They were in his dormitory bed, the curtains pulled, a silencing charm cast over the entire thing. He had smuggled her in; the Slytherin boys were less particular about keeping Gryffindor girls out of their rooms than the Gryffindors were about the Slytherins. He was tiring of her games, and with a swift movement rolled her beneath him and trapped her. He kissed her hard. She was suddenly serious. "Now," she said. "Do it now. Don't wait." She had told him it would be her first time; it was certainly his. His movements were awkward, but a few moments later he was successful, and she arched upwards, staring into his eyes, a small frown line between her brows.  
  
"It hurts you, Lily?"  
  
"Not exactly. Give me a moment."_  
  
"My voice?"  
  
"Two points from Ravenclaw," she whispered in a rush of breath, straight into his ear. "Say it for me." It had the desired effect; when her hand slid down his belly towards him, he was erect and ready for her.  
  
Now he did laugh. This was by far the oddest encounter he'd experienced with a former student, but as she gripped him, stroking firmly, his laughter died. He mustered his firmest Potions Master voice, though he had to swallow first. "Two points from Ravenclaw, Miss Lewis." She bit his ear, and then moved lower to suck at the side of his jaw. He could feel her raising a welt there. "Make that three points from Ravenclaw, Miss Lewis." His voice throbbed. She moaned a little, her hips wavering above him, teasing, taunting. When Snape's hips rose to try and seat himself within her, she swayed away.  
  
He spoke again. "I thought you were in a hurry, Miss Lewis." She seemed to like being referred to in the way she had been while at Hogwarts.  
  
"So I am," she whispered. She finally settled over him, and began to move. Her blue eyes were beautiful, and reminded him of  
  
 _Angharad, dear one_  
  
and in his confusion he almost spoke his mentor's name. While it often happened that he pictured Angharad or Lily during sex, he had never had their names rising so easily to his lips before.  
  
"Keep talking," Marina ordered.  
  
"What about?" Snape's hands at her hips were helping her set a long, slow rhythm. She had calmed from the first mad rush and seemed willing to go with him on a longer, sweeter journey, instead of a quick fuck.  
  
"Anything...anything...just talk to me." She brushed her thumbs over his sensitive nipples and pulled painfully at some of the hairs near them. Snape growled a little.  
  
Potions Master Snape began reciting the recipe from the potion the first years had brewed that morning. Her head fell back, and she was smiling, eyes closed. When he finished with the list of ingredients, he began to give her specific directions on how to stir this particular potion. "Slowly, slowly," he whispered hotly into her ear, wrapping his fingers in the strands of her hair, and pulling her face down to his. "Slide just a little to the side...yes, just there. I'll help you...oh...make sure we reach all parts of this cauldron. It's a very...warm cauldron, Miss Lewis."  
  
The pressure built and built, and eventually he felt her rhythm slowing, nearly halting, as she spasmed against him. "That's right," he whispered. "Ten points to Ravenclaw." He closed his eyes to come with her. And instantly, Hermione Granger was there in the bed with them. He saw again the heavy lids that lifted, languorous with desire, saw again the dreaming dark eyes that met and held his own, drew him in, swallowed his soul, or what there was of it. His eyes shot open, but his climax continued, ferocious, knotting. For a moment he was confused, for the dark hair swinging beside his face was not wild and honeyed curls.  
  
 _No. I will not go there. Oh, Hermione. Oh. I cannot help it. Merlin. Oh, Merlin, Hermione._  
  
He forced himself back from the cliff edge, but he could no longer speak. Marina, spent, slid to the side and smiled at him, moving his sweaty hair aside from his forehead with her soft fingers.  
  
"Lovely, lovely detention, thank you, Professor," she said. Her own eyes were heavy-lidded. He kissed her lips softly. _I have used you. Forgive me. Forgive me, Lily. Angharad. And you, as well, sweet girl._  
  
When Marina slept, which was not long in coming, Snape slid out of the bed, dressed himself, and let himself out of the flat.


	9. Coming to Terms

"you found creative ways to distance  
you hid away from much through humor  
your choice of armor was your intellect

and so you felt and you're still here  
and so you died and you're still standing  
and so you softened and you're still safely in command

self protection was in times of true danger  
your best defense to mistrust and be wary  
surrendering a feat of unequalled measure  
and I'm thrilled to let you in  
overjoyed to be let in in kind."

\-- Surrendering. Alanis Morissette.

The days following her conversation with Snape seemed to bleed away slowly. Thorough as ever, Hermione took a mental note of his instructions to pay special attention to the Samhain ritual, and began reading the book he lent her from the first page. She consumed it in her quick, yet moderate pace - a pace designed to allow every detail to curve onto her memory. Curiosity as to Snape's strange warning might bubble inside her, but she'd arrive at the description of the Samhain ritual in time: her heart might strive for knowledge, but her need for control was stronger, the longing rooted deeper. She knew that in order to keep functioning properly she must harness her baser urges, whatever they may be. It was bad enough to have the calm she felt after the night at the Stones finally abandoning her: she could not, must not, abandon her own watch. And so, she practiced, and waited.

Understanding dawned, at last, when she reached the pages describing the Samhain ritual. The skillfully drawn, medieval illustration might be small, but the intention was clear. So were the instructions, and the long, informative pages dedicated to the Samhain; a strange mixture of Middle English and Gaelic, in gothic, pointed script, an odd, beautiful brew of ancient poetry, magical theory and history. Did she want that beauty? Yes, she did. She craved it. Snape probably assumed she would back down from her request, facing the prospect of having to sleep with him. _Idiot man, she thought. Would I decline a scrap of excuse to shag you? Where the hell are your eyes??_

Slightly annoyed, Hermione put the book aside, looking at her hands, reddened once again. For a brief moment, they rested against the earth-brown leather binding of the Druid book. She had been struggling for the last two days, but everything seemed to penetrate the shield of oak water that was supposed to protect her hands; defiling the new, pink skin. She washed it with water, trying to fool herself into oblivion. When water failed to help, she retreated back to her old soap and antiseptics; scraping until there were tears in her eyes and a raw, tender new layer of dermis was exposed. At least the pain was accompanied by the comfort of knowing she was clean. Clean enough to touch the ancient, fragile book Snape had left in her care. Her Professor might claim she was clean, and he was probably right: she knew this was only madness. Nonetheless, she could not bring herself to touch the book with what her troubled mind insisted were filthy hands.

 _Small wonder_ , she mused after a while, _that I want to sleep with him. He tells me I'm clean_.

It seemed, then, that her decision was made. Hermione decided she'd approach Professor Snape later that evening.

* * *

  
" _What is this?_ "

In an instant, her hands were once again resting in her lap, away from Snape's scrutinizing gaze. "Are we here to discuss my possible apprenticeship," Hermione asked sharply, or my…" _mental_ , "…physical state?"

"We are here so you can answer whatever question I may pose to you," Snape replied coolly. "And I asked about your hands. Now show me your hands, Miss Granger."

"It is none of your business."

"I am your teacher, your temporary guardian according to this school's policy. Therefore, your well being and welfare is in every way my business. Your hands, please."

Swallowing, she untangled her hands and laid them on the table.

"Pull up your sleeves."

Hermione protested. "I don't see how-"

"Pull up your sleeves, I said."

She obeyed quietly, her jaw clenched in silent fury.

"You've been messing with your hands again. I've been thinking of this destructive habit of yours," he told her as his gaze roamed along the swollen, cracked skin. "Attempted to discern a pattern to your actions. I have met self-mutilators in the past: I know this is not the reason for the soreness, although," - and Hermione had to bite her lower lip so not to jump as Snape's index finger trailed gently along the white, thin lines left by a razor blade on the curve of her forearm - "I also know what tool left these." The Potions Master sobered at once, regaining his detached, cold demeanor. "I want you to tell me why you are abusing yourself."

She looked at him angrily. "I'm not."

"I warn you, Miss Granger. There will be no stupid games with me. I want the truth and I want it now."

"It's private."

"Then learn a charm to disguise the soreness. It would keep the matter private. Now stop wasting my time and answer my question."

Hermione breathed deeply. "I suffer an Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. It was diagnosed when I was five… My mother made me see a Muggle therapist- she was a bitch. I learned I'd better hide my problems, and it was over with time. Happy now, Professor?"

"It surely doesn't seem to be over to me."

"Last month was stressful," she said angrily, furious she should be explaining herself to him. "Sometimes there's an outbreak. It happens, then it subsides. That's all there is to it."

"And how long does such an outbreak usually last?"

"A week… or two," Hermione admitted.

"And this… recent outbreak has been going on for over a month?"

"Well, it doesn't mean it would last."

"It might mean, though, that perhaps you should be seeking professional help."

"I don't trust doctors."

Snape's eyes narrowed. "Why?"

"Not something I care to explain."

"I already told you, Miss Granger: I will brook no nonsense from you. _Why_?"

She shrugged her shoulders, and then breathed deeply. "I don't know, don't know. Perhaps because the bitch who treated me was a MD. Maybe I simply don't trust medical personnel."

"Both of your parents are doctors."

"So what?"

"You just said you don't trust MDs."

"That has nothing to do with it."

"Perhaps."

Hermione pursed her lips, but said nothing.

"What are you going to do, then?"

"Nothing."

Snape angled an eyebrow. " _Wrong_."

She stared at him angrily.

"You are going to receive some help- this state that you are in isn't going to continue now that I am aware of it. I admit to not knowing much when it comes to Muggle psychiatry. However, Madam Pomfrey is a well trained mediwitch and she should be able to determine at least a temporary solution, or a parallel wizarding definition of your condition that she could then treat with -"

"There is no way I'm going to see Madam Pomfrey about this," Hermione cut into Professor Snape's flow of speech, washed by cold sweat that stained the cloth of her school uniform, making it humid and clingy.

"What is it?" he inquired. "What's wrong with Madam Pomfrey?"

"I don't like her- I don't trust her. Whenever someone at Hogwarts suffers some ailment, you can be sure the staff, and then the rest of the school will know about it within the hour."

"These are very severe accusations," Snape answered mildly, "and I happen to know they aren't true."

"I don't know- don't care," she said. Her voice was shaking slightly. "I'm not seeing Madam Pomfrey, and that's my final word on the subject."

"You'll visit St. Mungo's, then," Snape retorted. "And that's _my_ final word on the subject."

"I'll think about it," Hermione said at last. Perhaps, she might be able to compromise her way out of it. After all, it was Snape's duty as a Hogwarts' teacher to see to his pupils' well being. Her mental or physical state, as long as she kept it under check, was of little interest to him: _give him few days_ , Hermione decided, _and he will forget everything about the subject_.

Snape, however, was not yielding. "You may have some time to prepare yourself-" he told her. "That is, if you can promise you won't damage yourself any further."

"This is pointless," Hermione burst out. "We're in the middle of the school year; there is no way I can visit St. Mungo's."

"There will be no problem for you to do it once you have been granted the Headmaster's permission. And I'm sure the Headmaster won't hesitate to give it, seeing your condition."

Hermione clenched her teeth. _So he is determined to see me treated: the book mentioned nothing about the Druid's annual charity, but that just might be it_. Nevertheless, Snape's suspicious fixation on the matter was the least of her problems. There was no way Dumbledore could be allowed to know of her secret. She respected the ancient wizard and in some way, even loved him: nonetheless, closely following the way Harry had been manipulated over the years, skillfully polished as a game piece or as the head of a spear, to finally be set as a pawn in the final battle - Hermione had little trust in Hogwarts' Headmaster. She had known very well that she couldn't show any of her cards to Albus Dumbledore. "Aren't you, as a Head of House, allowed to give me permission to leave Hogwarts during the school year?" she asked.

"If I were your Head of House," Snape replied, "I could. As I'm the head of Slytherin house, granting a Gryffindor permission to leave is beyond my authority."

"Can you talk to Professor McGonagall, then?"

The grey around Snape's black pupil diluted into a razorblade silence: his eyes cleared for the briefest of moments, and for an instant, it almost seemed easy to discern the pupil from the irises. Like a cat in the sun, lurking for its prey. "Why?"

She was the prey. And aware of her inferior position, tried to shrug off his query. "Why not?"

"You want me to talk to Professor McGonagall instead of the Headmaster," the Potions Professor's intonation was slow and moderated, as if he was talking to a retarded child. "You tell me why, and perhaps I will."

Hermione gritted her teeth, yet was careful to hide her anger. "I feel more comfortable with the Professor," she lied. "She's a woman, and I feel she might have been a lot like me when younger… I think she might understand."

"Tut tut, Miss Granger," Snape stopped her. "Has no one ever told you that when lying, you should remove your gaze from your opponent's eyes from time to time? Riveting your gaze this way induces a sense of intensity which is likely to give you away. Nevertheless, looking me in the eyes was the right thing to do, and it was a quick lie you managed. Not such a bad performance after all. Now tell me the truth: why McGonagall and not Dumbledore?"

Hermione tilted her head. "You demand much, Professor."

"I can," he said, unapologetically.

"And I can leave this room."

"Leave it, then."

Her answer was simple. "I don't want to. I don't think you want me to leave, either. Or else you would have shooed me off the moment the power of the Circle abated."

"Where are you leading with this line of reasoning?"

She looked him in the eyes. Subdued curiosity, if not a spark of amusement. "You want me here, just like I want to be here. I'd like you to respect that."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning I won't be the fly in your Slytherin web. Push me over the edge, and I'll leave. You are my teacher, and therefore it is your responsibility to see to my welfare. See me to St. Mungo's, then. But it shall be Professor McGonagall to grant me her permission to leave, not the Headmaster, and my reasons I will keep to myself. These are my conditions, is that clear, Sir?"

Snape seemed to consider her words for a while. At last, he opened his mouth to speak. "Clear enough, Miss. Granger. In return, I'd like you to tell me the truth when I ask you a question. No beating around the bush, no lies if you can't make them seem like the truth. No games. If you can't share the truth with me, say so. I may push you, and I will expect an honest answer if I'm doing so. That is, since I expect you to trust my judgment. If you can't trust my judgment, I see no point in taking this any further. It should also be noted, that at any point, you can stand up and walk way. Is _that_ clear, Miss Granger?"

She nodded. "Yes, Professor."

"Good. Now tell me," he asked, "why do you wish to become my apprentice?"

Hermione frowned, inspecting the whirling, clear pool that fisted all those different reasons to make her want - _crave_ \- for this knowledge, in a palm of white sand and smooth stone. She squared her shoulders, feeling as if the tips of her fingers touched the pond's shimmering, glowing water, and were now aglow with the liquid's splendor. "Magic - or so I have come to think over my years here at Hogwarts - is the most basic way of manipulating the universe's power according to our own will. However, seeing what I saw only days ago, I…" she pursed her lips. "What we're doing with our wands is rough and intrusive: it is not magic in its most basic, raw form. We are not working with the universe the way I begin to suspect we should be working: there is no method or paradigm behind our schooling. You have been my teacher for more than six years now," she continued quietly. "You know I am suspicious and that I tend to ask questions. I read the book you gave me: I don't know whether the Druid way is the right way, although, although…-" her voice failed her for an instant, and she mastered it at once, blinking fiercely.

She wasn't sure she had the words to describe what she wanted to say next, and therefore, avoiding Snape's eyes, that grew more intense with each passing moment, stretched out her hands, and put them on the table. "After… that night," she continued slowly. "It was okay, you know. I could wear that stupid cloak. I could touch it. Do you see what I mean?" Her brow knotted, and she looked at her hands resting on the table, not far away from Snape's: both outlined against the dark wood: red and blue-white against deep brown.

She didn't see Snape's response, but she heard him saying: "Yes, I think I do."

"Do you really?" It was hard not to let the sarcasm tint her voice. To Hermione's surprise, he seemed relatively amused at her withheld suspicion. _Perhaps_ , she suddenly thought, _I have just isolated the key component to deciphering Severus Snape. One must look in the shadows: for that certain shade of grey that is darker than black. Blacker than dark: or brighter than white. All, she concluded, has to do with looking at the tips of the spectrum_.

"We all bear our scars." A hint of a smile shifted the delicate web of age lines sheeting Professor Snape's face. Longish, pale and ugly, with sallow skin and hooked, thin nose, which looked disproportionate even when matched with the high brow, and sharp, pointed chin. Nevertheless, there was an elfin quality about this set of features: a fey, ethereal look that told of dark forests, trickling brooks with crystal clear water, and cool, clear ponds, like the Goddess' shimmering eyes. She still found his hair to be repulsive; and scowling - which seemed to be his favourite expression - only served to make him uglier. Nevertheless, Hermione realized this wasn't the man she'd thought he was for more than six years.

Nor was it the man she wanted to corrupt her, or the man whose image woke her up at night, after having dreamed of him. But if so… shouldn't the gnawing mole at the pit of her stomach be calmed down? Wasn't it the sign the wooden stake was finally nibbled to the core, setting her free? Why had wanting him become even worse? The book, the damn book; the damn rites. Having only her damn hands and the shower head for over three weeks.

Hermione decided she should change the subject, before she was cornered by her thoughts. "When do you need me to return the book?"

"I don't," said Snape. "It was given to me- years ago, by my own mentor, Angharad. The way it was given to her, at the time. Keep it, Miss Granger. You're going to need it."

* * *

  
The interview- for she knew no better name to call it, was over just in time for Hermione to make it into her room and change for the DA meeting. Hurriedly, she stripped off her school uniform, donned jeans and jumper under her standard black robes, and went down to the common room to meet Harry and Ron.

Harry - to her great discomfort - was missing once again, and Hermione was too distracted by being alone in Ron's company to wish he'd at least manage to get to the meeting on time.

"Hello!" Hermione called, using one of Donna's rose-coloured smiles to disguise her discomfort.

Ron, hands in the back pockets of his trousers, replied with a murmured 'Howdy'.

"Shall we go, then?" she suggested. _God forbid, I sound just like **her**_.

"Sure 'Mione." Ron didn't bother to correct himself, and Hermione, on the other hand, didn't bother to correct him either.

They made their way to the Room of Requirement with uncomfortable silence, their sweet, worn-out, cotton silence long ago forgotten. _Back to lipstick, plastic and Muggle food colouring_ , Hermione thought. _Nonetheless, it's better this way_. Ron was a sweet pet, but one she had grown tired of: they no longer suited each other. Deep in her heart, she hoped he'd be wise enough to pick up the clues. She hardly cared to give him the speech…

Harry, to Hermione's enormous relief, was already in the Room of Requirement. Although a little shaggy, The Boy Who Lived was as alert and animated a guide as ever: _poor Harry_ , she mused. He almost succeeded in disguising the forlorn, longing look that haunted his eyes. _God. Aren't the three of us just fucked up_.

Sadly, only two and a half hours later, Hermione could barely remember why she ever felt sorry for Harry-meddling-Potter.

"Why don't you two take a walk to the common room while I'm taking care of things over here?" Harry suggested in his sweetest I'm-an-orphaned-boy-who-should-be-pitied voice.

"Why don't you shut up, you cun-"

He just smiled. "I don't think your mother would approve of your using of that word, love."

"And stop calling me that!"

"Sorry. Now go, I'm busy."

"Yeah," Ron muttered, joining the conversation for the first time. "He's meeting his mystery girl."

"Ron is jealous," Harry explained. "Are you leaving yet?"

Hermione rolled her eyes. "Sure, sure. We wouldn't want to ruin your sex life. One of us is bound to roam Hogwarts' corridors with love-bites glowing red on his neck, crying: I'm a claimed property."

She knew her words were hurting him the moment they were out of her mouth: that for some reason, this property would, or could not be claimed, and she wished to be able to take back what she said. Wished for a more private setting, so she'd be able to soothe the pain out of those beautiful, green eyes. To somehow make it easier on Harry. She couldn't, though, as Ron was now claiming her hand; dragging her outside - similarly though not exactly the way she did a mere three weeks ago - and Harry was more fiercely shooing them out of the room. She tried to signal him silently that she was sorry, but Merlin only knew she was a social and emotional wreck.

"So…" she began nervously, once the door was finally shut behind them. "Who do you think is Harry's mystery girl?"

Ron shrugged. "Whoever she is, she's doing him no good."

"So you've noticed," Hermione said, a bit surprised.

Ron's lips thinned bitterly. "I know you sometimes think I'm a dolt, and I'm definitely not as clever as you, but it still doesn't make me an idiot, you know."

She looked at the tips of her shoes. "I know. And I'm sorry."

"It's alright. Hard to blame you anyway. Can't imagine what it's like… being so clever."

"It has advantages and deficiencies," Hermione dismissed the subject.

"So…" it seemed to be Ron's turn to fidget. "I think we both know it's not Harry we're supposed to be talking about."

"Yeah."

"So how have you been?"

"It's been up and down. You know me."

"Yeah."

"And you?"

"Alone. I missed you."

She tensed. "Ron, don't-"

"It's alright," Ron was quick to address her distress. "I know. I told you. I'm not stupid. Was just bringing up a fact."

Hermione nodded. "Very well. I'm sorry for… stringing you along you like this. It was selfish and unfair of me. You should be angry with me."

He gave her a sideway glance. "And your point is?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean… this is how you are. This is how I love you. I suppose that if you could handle this better, you would. I know you're sorry now, suppose you felt ashamed of yourself at the time. Don't get me wrong, I was angry, but then… well- I don't know. Maybe it's the war and stuff. Makes you see things more clearly."

She smiled at him: softly, melancholically. "Thanks Ron, I appreciate that. I love you too, you know, just… not this way."

He snorted. "Figured that one out." The lamplight shone in his red, beautiful mane, bringing out the strong colour against his creamy complexion. Tall, muscled, lovely featured. Her own Thor.

Smiling, Hermione reached to take his hand, interlacing their fingers. "Yes. I should have known you would," She said. "Now how about we go to my room? I'd like to end it in a way we'd both like to remember."

Ron gave her offer a minute's consideration. "Sure, why not?"

* * *

  
"You know," Ron said with a sleepy voice, "it was never quite this way when we were together."

They were lying in each other's arms, washed in the cool light of the sun's first lemony rays that slanted from the arched windows. The quilt, like another being, having a symbiotic existence to their own, was wrapped around them in a disheveled mess, maintaining sweat and body heat. Turning to face Ron, Hermione had gently curled her fingers in the fine down that covered his chest, leaning to kiss a pink nipple. "It's easier," she murmured. "Now that the stress is gone. Now that we're both where we should be and our positions reflect what we are to each other. It makes it possible to make love to you."

"As a friend?" he asked, a little skeptically.

She stiffened a little. "What did you think I was doing?"

"Well… having fun. Well, don't get me wrong, Mio-Hermione. I don't think there's anything wrong with that."

"No, no," she relaxed. "It's okay. It's simply not what I felt, being with you last night."

"So you'd sleep with Harry, too?"

She laughed. "Harry's not my type. Too… androgynous. Too pretty. I'd like to cuddle him, not fuck him!"

"So you say I'm ugly?" Ron taunted her.

"You dolt!" Hermione cried, squirming under Ron's weight, which nailed her to the mattress. "I'd say you're shaggable, tall and rough and… Mmm… masculine…"

* * *

  
They were late for breakfast; grinning like two fools at a very confused Harry.

"I thought you two had broken up?" he asked, forking a piece of bacon.

"We did," Ron told him, loading his plate with an equal amount of nutritious and disgusting, greasy food.

Harry was still suspicious. "So why the sex look?"

"Don't be ridiculous." Hermione glared at him. "And what is a sex look? I never heard of it before."

"A look one gets after having lots of sex," Harry explained with feigned fatigue. "It's quite clear from the expression."

She raised an eyebrow. "Clearly Harry, we had sex."

"But Ron just said you broke up!"

"And so we did," she confirmed. "Are you trying to tell me all the sex you've ever had was part of a relationship?"

Harry sighed. "Just… just drop it… It's too early in the morning for me, to handle this kind of intellectual puzzle. Maybe later I'll manage to figure you two out."

Ron squeezed his best friend's shoulder affectionately. "I have no doubt you will, mate. No doubt at all."


	10. Chapter 10

_god's terrible face, brighter than a spoon,  
collects the image of one fatal word  
so that my life(which liked the sun and the moon)  
resembles something that has not occurred:  
i am a birdcage without any bird,  
a collar looking for a dog,a kiss  
without lips;a prayer lacking any knees  
but something beats within my shirt to prove  
he is undead who,living,noone is.  
  
  
\-- e.e.cummings_  
  
  
  
Snape took the long walk back to Hogwarts at a pace close to a run. He was glad of the darkness. It meant that no one would see the flaring colour in his cheeks, colour not born of his exertion or the single glass of Stolichnaya, long gone from his system. Colour born of his internal torment. His black robes billowed behind him, thrashed in the wind of his velocity.  
  
Back in the dungeons at last, he slammed into his quarters and stood staring wildly about him. Everything in his tidy quarters was in place, yet it seemed as if every least item had been moved, a bare half inch out of proper alignment: twisted, tipped, rotated, disturbed. He went to his bedroom, intending to throw himself on the bed and perhaps sleep, hopeful that after sex and the long, hard walk, his body would finally be ready for rest and would overrule his spinning brain.  
  
But the distortion continued in his room, made worse by the bed, the **bed** that stood hulking in front of him like a ship driven atilt onto rocks. His _**BED**_ , in which he would most likely only think of Hermione as he lay there. Marina was already forgotten despite the lovely and pleasurable fucking he'd needed so much, but the other three women in his interior sexual life, Angharad, Lily, and, now, Hermione Granger, were ravaging the forefront of his thoughts.  
  
The noise that ripped from his throat was that of anguish. He couldn't stay here.  
  
There were, really, only two possible sanctuaries. The Stones, and his dungeon classroom. It was too bloody cold out, and too far, to consider the Stones. The classroom it would be. As he left his quarters, he snatched a bottle of Jameson's out of a cupboard in his sitting room and stuffed it inside his robes.  
  
Snape warded the doors more strongly than ever, changing the passwords from "Cogito ergo sum" to "I think, therefore I should not be." He could always put them back later, but just now he wanted no interruptions. A Friday night in dark October; what better time to get drunk. He had the entire weekend ahead of him. He and the Jameson's sank down between the lab tables, hidden from all view, comforted by the cold stone of the floor, and sheltered by the tall tables. He uncapped the bottle, realized he had forgotten a glass, and drank straight from the neck. It scorched all the way down, welcome and cleansing heat and fumes.  
  
It was Lucius Malfoy who had introduced him to Jameson's all those years ago. Beautiful Lucius, the Slytherin jewel who showed Snape exactly the shape of Snape's soul at the time he least wanted to see it: foul, twisted, but brilliant. The Jameson's was a means to an end, the breaking of barriers, the key to Snape's locked-away pain. Lucius already belonged to Voldemort, and in Snape he found the perfect pawn, a new soldier in Voldemort's growing army. Young, isolated, ugly, and hurting, Snape was ripe for the picking. Lucius had enjoyed Snape's blossoming under Voldemort's rough tutelage. And at last Snape had a new friend, one who shared his interests and his intellect. Lucius.  
  
_"Snivellus!" James, and Sirius, standing near Peter and Remus. Pointing, laughing. Severus' hand went for his wand, but James was faster, disarming him instantly. More laughter, followed by taunting, and then Scourgify, so strongly cast it amounted to a hex as Severus stammered his anger. The O.W.L.s had been bad enough, difficult and draining, but this was much worse. Lily's Gryffindor crowd...he didn't dare to blast them to oblivion, she wouldn't approve in the slightest. Why did she run with them?  
  
Why does she run with you, Severus?  
  
She loves me.  
  
She's kind, that's all. She feels pity. Poor bewildered Severus, alone, unloved, abused by a cuffing father, unprotected by a cringing mother. Pity. Remember you told her the whole miserable story, one of those long conversations.  
  
She loves me.  
  
She's never told you so. She likes the sex. She likes the control she has over you. Her own pet Slytherin slave. Bit of a forbidden thrill for a Gryffindor edging into the cusp of Ravenclaw, reckless, bright and sharp.  
  
Lies. Lies!  
  
But that niggling suspicion remained. He almost choked on the pinkish foam of Scourgify covering his lips, spitting desperately to clear his mouth. He reached his wand._  
  
Another swallow of Jameson's. How many times had he relived this particular memory? It seemed to surface anytime he was distracted or upset. It went to the bone, like Voldemort's Dark Mark on his left arm.  
  
_Movement, a bit away from the group. Swing of dark red hair. Lily!  
  
"When are you going to bathe, Snivellus...wash that greasy hair of yours?"  
  
Vile green light shot from Severus' wand. He couldn't speak around the foam, but his intention was brutal.  
  
A cut opened in James' cheek. There was blood, and immediately James' wand was raised again and Severus was upside down, dangling in mid-air. Severus' wand was knocked from his hand again. This late in the school year, his heavy winter robes -- the only ones he had -- were too hot for other clothes underneath, and so when the robes flipped over his head, obstructing his vision, he knew his pale, thin shanks were visible, along with what he wore under the robes: not much. Old underwear, much washed, and beginning to be ragged.  
  
It wasn't that there was no money. There was. There should have been enough to pay for decent clothing. It was more that there was no love, no thought, no provision. Severus looked too much like his father, and his father hated himself. Had it not been for the Hogwarts invitation, Severus would have remained at home, watching the awful dance that was his father's control over his mother, and her fortune.  
  
"Look at that!" James again, laughing uproariously. From the sounds of it, quite a crowd was gathering to watch the spectacle. Much laughter. Severus tried vainly to summon his wand, but with the robes over his head and hands, could not find it though he could feel it nudging at the shrouding cloth. "Wonder what's UNDER that old grey underwear! Let's find out!"  
  
"Stop it, James." Lily's voice. Cool, strident. "Put him down, it isn't funny anymore."  
  
Merlin. The humiliation, the fury. I will see you dead for this, James.  
  
James let him fall. "Lucky for you Evans took your side, Snivellus."  
  
The rage flared out of control, and he was driven to scorch Lily with it. The girl he wanted, the girl he could talk with, the girl who had given him her virginity, and taken his. "I don't need the help of a Mudblood." Like father, like son._  
  
It would take more than two swallows of Jameson's to drive James and Lily back into the dark where they belonged. Snape drank again. The dungeon floor didn't seem so cold any longer.  
  
_Severus, running after Lily later that week. "I didn't mean it."  
  
"You did. Why say it, else?"  
  
"I was angry."  
  
"So I saw. James was bleeding."  
  
"I'm sorry."  
  
"I'm not. It makes a few things abundantly clear, Severus."  
  
He halted. So did she. "What do you mean?"  
  
"You're a pureblood. I'm not. This will never work out."  
  
"I can look past that."  
  
Bitter laughter from Lily. "That's just it, Severus. Listen to yourself talk. YOU have to look past it, when it shouldn't even occur to you as an obstacle."  
  
Silence. She had driven a spike through his heart. His father's ugly heart, beating in Severus' own pale chest. What else of Father was in him?  
  
At last, wrenched from him: "Let me try."  
  
She put out a trembling hand. "You have to let me in, Severus."  
  
Again: "Let me try."  
  
"I can't do this if you're going to be so...so...cold."  
  
"Lily." Despair, until she let him touch her again._  
  
While the floor had ceased to seem cold, it was still hard. Snape used the lab table nearest him to pull himself upright and stumble along to his office, where the chair was more comfortable and he could drink himself into a stupor. The purity and sanctuary of his dungeon no longer seemed important, but getting drunk did.  
  
_By early in their sixth year, though, he found his father's heart to be too strong. Lily was simply too warm, too bold, and with each of her forward steps (except for sex -- the sex was still the best thing about their relationship, the sex and the way the world had narrowed down to just the two of them -- no more Gryffindor crowd, just Severus and Lily, Severus and Lily, Severus and Lily) he retreated. Cold, colder, and finally coldest, when she asked him if he loved her.  
  
"You suit me," was the closest he could come.  
  
Hard, glittering emerald eyes stared him down. "You don't love me at all. You control me. That's what you love."  
  
"I want you!"  
  
"You want a doll to play with, to dress and pose and...and...fuck." The word was ugly, coming from her, born of her distress. "You don't want me. We're done here."_  
  
There, his chair. He fell into it. The black leather was cool, but it warmed rapidly. The level in the Jameson's was rather alarmingly low; should he fetch another bottle from his quarters, enough for the weekend? Not yet, not yet. Another sip, to chase that Lily-ghost.  
  
_"You don't look well, Severus. Is something wrong? Did something happen with your Gryffindor girl?"  
  
Severus looked up slowly at Lucius, Head Boy of Hogwarts. Beautiful, beautiful Lucius. Gold and grey, heat and ice. "Mine no longer." Bitter, bitter words.  
  
Lucius cocked a hip and leaned against Severus' library table. "Pity. She looks like quite the luscious f..." Trailing off, seeing the glare.  
  
Silence.  
  
"It must hurt, though. Why don't you come with me, Severus? I was planning on a little self-indulgence this evening...you look like you could use some."  
  
"What do you mean?" Quill brushing his lips and jaw. Still two essays to write.  
  
Lucius' tapered fingers reached to close Severus' book. "Getting drunk," he said. "That's what I mean."  
  
"I don't drink."  
  
"You're missing a lot. Muggle whiskey, incredible. Beats firewhiskey, no contest. A much better buzz."_  
  
And in the end, Snape had gone with Lucius to his Head Boy's room, and they had shared the Jameson's. Snape was drunk enough to tell Lucius everything the blond wanted to know, and not remember much about it afterwards, except to recall how comforted he'd felt, how sympathetic Hogwarts' Head Boy had been about the whole Gryffindor affair, the public humiliation, and the cut on James' face.  
  
And he'd returned, each Friday night for three weeks after that, to repeat the process. Drinking, chatting, finally drunk, confessing, passing out, forgetting. When Lucius pulled back the velvet of his sleeve, to show Severus the Dark Mark, taken just that spring, Severus was fetched. He liked the things his new friend had shown him so far.  
  
_"Voldemort, you say?"  
  
"Yes. You wouldn't believe the power this Mark gives me, Severus. I think you'd like that power. Even the merest taste...heady wine, better than whiskey."  
  
Derisive laugh. "Not much is better than this Jameson's."  
  
" **This** is. Come with me next time."  
  
"When?"  
  
"I never quite know; he calls me when he will. But...Severus...there will be time for me to find you, bring you with me. The Dark Lord has been looking for someone like you. Someone with your intelligence will be most valued."_  
  
And at midsummer, Snape had taken the Dark Mark. The perception of a new power was incredible; addicting; intoxicating. Perhaps power was not the right word, but certainly there was a shackling of his conscience; a new set of rules for Snape to play by. A certain willingness to do things his conscience would otherwise have forbidden, Slytherin though he was. Now, when he cast hexes, there was a pride in their strength; a pride in the ease with which he could intend to injure. He no longer felt a compulsion to hold back in any way. These things the Dark Mark freed in him. As Lucius had promised, it was better than the whiskey; better, even, than sex with Lily. There were other women in the world, as he discovered.  
  
With this sort of strength at his fingertips, there was no need to return home, to watch his brutal father and bone-weary mother spiral towards each other, ever closer to a final ending point. He took a job in London, in a shop off Knockturn Alley, brewing potions and creating new ones for Voldemort. He lived with Lucius in the other man's flat and acquired a taste for the softer things in life; the better things; the expensive things. And through the last years at Hogwarts, he had enough money to do as he pleased; buy his own Jameson's, buy his own robes, and never wear ragged underwear again. His colours were the Slytherin colours, used to relieve the starkness of the black he loved best.  
  
To another man those points might have seemed foolish; but to Snape, they were the beginning of a new life. A new confidence. A new Snape, colder, brutal, almost the Slytherin jewel he had always longed to be. Almost. Lily and her Gryffindor crowd gave him a wide, wide berth. More than one of them had felt the freezing sting of the new anger in his wand; anger liberated by the change the Dark Mark had wrought in him. He had friends among the Death Eaters. He had no need of friends at Hogwarts any longer.  
  
Seventh year came. Lily had been dating James for most of their sixth year.  
  
_James, bragging in the corridors between classes. "She'll marry me. Once we leave school, she'll marry me. Lily, Lily Potter. What about that, Sirius? How's that sound?"  
  
Severus, out of sight around the corner, froze in his tracks. He sank back against the corridor wall, clenching his long fingers into fists, feeling his nails cut into his palms. Shock filled his brain to the exclusion of all else, for many moments. He heard Sirius slapping James on the back, congratulating him. Lily Potter. It might have been Lily Snape, once, but for his inability to say he loved her, wanted her, needed her. And after the shock of hearing she would forever belong to his worst enemy eased, the only thought Snape could muster in response was an ugly and petty one. She may marry you, yes...but I had her first. I had your Lily. I plucked **that** bloom._  
  
His NEWTs scores were nearly off the charts; the highest mark given, ever, in Potions. All due to the experience he gained working for Voldemort. And so on to university, and his Potions Mastery, gained quickly, far ahead of schedule. During that time Lucius and Narcissa were married and Lucius took his bride back to the Malfoy's ancestral home, leaving Snape alone in London, and high on Voldemort's short list of favorites.  
  
Now Snape put his feet up on his desk, heedless of the stack of parchments that spilled to the floor. The Jameson's he set carefully in the bottom drawer, capped, after another hit from the bottle; it would not do for it to spill, no, not his whiskey. His precious oblivion.  
  
_What had finally ended the Death Eater romance? Was it the endless rounds of futile plotting, the posturing, the bragging, of Voldemort with no real progress made -- boring, beyond boring, excruciating -- or was it that last, most twisted potion that broke the camel's back?  
  
"I want a new potion, Severus."  
  
How many potions had he created for Voldemort? Countless, countless. Mostly indifferent or wicked in their intent, the mindlessness of them beginning to wear on him, nearly as boring as the meetings. "Of what sort?"  
  
"It will contain the vitality of the young. I will drink it myself."  
  
"And what ingredient will supply that vitality, my Lord?"  
  
Voldemort's gleeful, horrid rubbing of hands. "The secret longings of a teenage boy. Legilimens should do; I understand you've been training with Lucius. You will find me those cherry-dark dreams and put them in that potion. And...one last thing...I find I have a taste for something even younger...fetch me a potion with the sweetness of a baby's crying. In its final moments, when life is most precious and most precarious. And I wouldn't say no to a bit of its mother's grief and misery for added spice, my talented one." Licking of lips, rhythmic squeezes of fingers. Voldemort knew his skilled Potions Master could do it.  
  
Finally, a line Severus couldn't cross. The killing of a babe, a life that was more than innocent. Utter revulsion. An excuse, finally, to back out of the meetings, to quietly vanish from the roster. By the end of that year, Severus had exited the Death Eater circle unless there was a specific summons. Fortunately Voldemort's ambition was such that a potion for entertainment purposes was soon forgotten._  
  
He was sleeping now -- more accurately, passed out -- mouth agape, sprawled bonelessly in his chair. Conscience Minerva prowled at the edges of his dreams, prying at his memories, unharnessing the better memories, striving to heal.  
  
Memories of Angharad, she who stopped his slow drift.  
  
_Weeks in Oxfordshire, rambling aimlessly, no job, no real place to live, sleeping in Muggle pubs. Wandering, wearing out shoes, mending them with Transfigurations but doing little other magics. Touring prehistoric monuments, seeking the so-called power latent therein, finding nothing. Walking along leys, vectors of force connecting three or more sacred points in a straight line. He had never quite believed in them, the legends of dragons traveling along them, yet he felt compelled to explore them. While he didn't believe in dragons of power, he did believe in power itself. Yet, he found nothing.  
  
Until.  
  
The night of the full moon, just at sunset, at the Rollright Stones, a smallish Stone Circle with oddly short dolmens, small and ugly like rotted teeth. A woman there, inside the circle, chanting, burning incense. And power rising from her like steam, like smoke, like perfume. He stepped inside her circle, breaking her concentration, but she only beckoned him forward, to take her hands.  
  
He had seen her cloak fly, though at the time he had not recognized the ring of force that rose as he touched her, completing some mystic circuit.  
  
"Teach me this," he had begged, the first thing in his life he'd wanted, since Lily.  
  
"Prove to me you are worthy," she had countered. "Great evil is within you, and great wounds."_  
  
A year of her tutelage, six months of proving himself before she let him celebrate a rite with her again. A year of peace, no summons from Voldemort; somewhere during that year James and Lily were killed, and Voldemort vanquished by their baby son (a moment in which Snape's Dark Mark nearly combusted -- Angharad held him for hours, rocking him in her arms, drawing out the bitterness and the pain and horror, hearing it all). A year in which his mother died ( _How, father, did **THAT** happen, I wonder? A finally too-careless blow? _) and his father became a drunken recluse. Snape did not go home for her funeral. A year in which Angharad taught him what she knew, and sent him to an old, old friend of hers, Albus Dumbledore, for the rest of his penance.  
  
And so began his life as a spy for the Light, turned from the Dark by the cry of a babe and the mythos and silent awe of the Druid rituals. Severus Snape, priest. Holy at last, if not whole.  
  


~*~

  
  
When he awakened some time mid-afternoon that Saturday, his head was splitting, his mouth was dry and tasted as foul as one of the potions he'd brewed for Voldemort those untold years ago, but Lily and James were quiet. Conscience Minerva was still prowling, only now she showed him Hermione. The Jameson's looked at him innocently from the opened bottom desk drawer. He reached to close the drawer. _Enough, Snape_. He stumbled to a sink in the classroom and shoved his head under the cold stream of water from the faucet, cooling his heated face. Then he turned his mouth up and drank deeply.  
  
The flow of clean water reminded him of Hermione Granger, and her red, red hands. Her unclean hands, whatever that nonsense was about. He would have to get to the bottom of that, somehow. Granger, apparently his new apprentice, since she'd agreed to most of his ground rules -- and set down a few of her own. She'd met his gaze more or less calmly when he asked if she was clear about what the rites entailed.  
  
Snape himself was not calm at all about what those rites entailed. So much of him wished he had never agreed, the night of the new moon ritual, to teach her these things. But he'd been so elated, so overwhelmed, so... _thrilled_...that his Stones had awoken, he would have agreed to much more had she asked. And another, larger part of him wanted Hermione, wanted her more than he had wanted anything in his miserable life. Or, almost anything. His druid training with Angharad...that came first, and remained first, in his very short list of "things Snape did right."  
  
Sex with a student, even for reasons of religious celebrations, would not be tolerated, though it was well within his own personal parameters of what was acceptable.  
  
He was begging to be sacked. And Hermione would be expelled, or at best, transferred, if they were found out. Conscience Minerva was clear on this point, compellingly clear. But the equally clear voice of Angharad stated that this Druid training was what Hermione needed and wanted; a lodestar, a new magnetic North to moderate the extreme swing of the peculiar pendulum of her life.  
  
His personal pantheon was changing. His triple goddess was reborn, recast, renewed; Lily and her ghostly memory had been supplanted at last. Had he been in his Circle this day, wanding names in the red, red leaves, he would have written:  
  
ANGHARAD.  
  
MINERVA.  
  
HERMIONE.  
  
He slicked the water from his hair with his hands, blinking, and returned to his quarters, this time to sleep off his hangover in his own bed, no longer atilt. He took no potions to quiet the throbbing in his head; he did not deserve to feel better any sooner than he should.  
  


~*~

  
  
Tuesday morning Snape's fragile control was shattered when Hermione Granger and _Weasley_ sauntered into the Great Hall, together, and languorously late, looking well-shagged and sated. His hand clenched abruptly, and this time it was he who broke a teacup.  
  
Minerva and Flitwick stared, but he offered no explanation. After glaring in the direction of Granger and her bookend brothers for the remainder of the meal, Snape billowed angrily off to his classroom. There he laid waste about himself, unfairly assigning yards of punishment essays and detentions with Filch for the slightest imagined infraction.  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can visit these sites for pictures of the Rollright Stones in Oxfordshire and the adjacent King Stone and Whispering Knights, where Angharad celebrates her rites and trains Snape:  
> http://www.megalithia.com/sites/sp296309.html  
> http://www.themodernantiquarian.com/site/65#images


	11. Chapter 11

"I'd be lying if I said I was completely unscathed  
I might be proving you right with my silence or my retaliation  
would I be letting you win in my non reaction?"  
  
\-- Can't Not. Alanis Morissette.  
  
  
Knowing Snape, Hermione was not sure what to expect, only that she should expect something. Probably to be toyed with, as she had no doubt that no matter what she would say and how much she might protest, she would remain the fly caught in the Potions Master's web. Not because she doubted him: she had long ago learned to respect the bitter, sarcastic Professor and knew she could trust him with her life. Nevertheless, Snape was a predator owl, silent and calculating in his pursuit, before swooping to pounce on his prey. _It was his nature_.  
  
And if she was destined to be pierced by his claws, Hermione decided she'd better be prepared.  
  
He had been glaring at her during meals from the staff table for the last couple of days, cold, furious or indifferent at her discreet attempts to reach him. While this behaviour was discouraging, Hermione discovered it only made her more curious about the man. _Fascinated with the bad-boy image, now are you?_ She rebuked herself. Extremely unhealthy, to say the least. And yet Snape seemed to hold more than an image: this specific puzzle had enough pieces to be assembled into a picture of a breathing, hurting, broken man. One her inner Category Romance reader wanted to stitch together. That is, if she could not be healed by him. _Next thing I'll be planning our wedding and picking out names for our children_ , Hermione concluded. _Then I can peacefully change my surname to "Brown"_.  
  
At last, almost five days after their conversation, her initiation finally began. _With knots_. Luckily, she wasn't a good Potions student for nothing. She had good eye-hand coordination, and soon enough, she mastered the complicated ties meant to attach the Druid attire to the body. It didn't mean she was going to wear one any time soon. At the moment, they were mainly taking long walks where they could not be seen, discussing a large variety of subjects- some of them related to Druidism; some of them not. _Getting to know each other_ \- Hermione thought cynically.  
  
She was not surprised to find out Snape was good company. He was knowledgeable, witty, an intriguing conversationalist: his dark humour was always something she secretly enjoyed in the classroom - on those unfortunately rare occasions when it wasn't aimed toward one of her friends if not herself. He was usually undemanding when it came to personal information she wished to keep private, and rarely spoke about himself. _Detached, cool- unburdening. Shaggable_ , she mused idly. _More like daydreaming_.  
  
 _Even in our flaws, we are alike. I wonder if too much alike; whether I'm likely to close my eyes someday and find the side of my palm melted into the blue-white, slightly humid skin of his hand… That instead of being two bodies God reversed the experiment, and made us one flesh…_  
  
Hermione was so lost in her thoughts that she didn't notice what Snape was doing until one tattered leather boot was lying on the dewy grass.  
  
"What exactly do you think you're doing?" she shrieked. "It's freezing!"  
  
Snape, who was on the process of removing his boots, turned to glare at her. Nevertheless, a spark of amusement glinted in the lucid depths of his dark, hawkish eyes. "What does it looks like I'm doing?" he snarled.  
  
"Freezing yourself to death!" she cried. "At least that what it looks like to me." And shivering a little at the sight, Hermione snuggled deeper into the soaking heat of her winter cloak.  
  
The Potions Master, to her surprise, only threw his head backward, the harsh wind disheveling his lanky hair, and laughed with the kind of sweet abundance she would have never expected to see in a man of Snape's stature. Sunrays, filtered through a colander of grey clouds, illuminated his face - as if scissoring it from the foggy morning - and the same wind that played with the locks of his hair was thrusting the grass stems against the worn-out leather of his boots. Boots, she noted, which were now resting together with his socks in the high, fresh grass. "That's why," Snape began, pulling his wand out of his sleeve, "we use a warming spell." He cast the spell, lifting his gaze to scrutinize her. "You may remove your footwear, too."  
  
She shook her head, a little shocked at the prospect. "No thank you, Sir."  
  
"Don't you ever walk barefoot, Miss Granger?"  
  
"My mother would kill me."  
  
Snape cocked an eyebrow. "And do you always listen to what your mother tells you?" he taunted her.  
  
"That doesn't merit a response."  
  
For some reason, her answer seemed to entertain him. "I spent most of my childhood barefooted. Wearing shoes, you're much more likely to make noise and be noticed." He frowned. "At least that's what I thought at the time. Then I was forced to wear shoes, once I was accepted into Hogwarts: to have something separating me from the earth." Snape looked at his boots with more than a little suspicion. "It happens, then, that I still do not completely trust anything but my own foot. Your body, Miss Granger, is the best instrument you're ever going to get. Use it, and use it wisely."  
  
She pursed her lips. Being corrected made her forget all about her former curiosity as to the child's reasons to go about unnoticed, replacing it with indignation. "You want me to take off my shoes, then?"  
  
"We attempt to work with nature," Snape answered coolly. "You should experience the ground you're walking on not through false layers of plastic and leather, but with your own soles."  
  
"You can just tell me to take off my shoes," Hermione insisted.  
  
He scowled. "Come here."  
  
"What is it now?"  
  
"Would you just shut up and do as I tell you?"  
  
She obeyed him, seating herself on the ground next to Snape.  
  
Beside her, the Professor reached to dig between the grass stems, shoving them aside until his long, pale fingers stuck into the muddy earth, plunging into the wet dirt and pulling out a handful of soil.  
  
Hermione flinched, withdrawing at once.  
  
 _He wouldn't let her_. Reaching to seize Hermione's elbow, he anchored her to the spot, and ignoring her struggle, brought his dirtied hand close to her face.  
  
She cried. "What are you doing?"  
  
"This is the earth you're walking on. The earth that gives life to everything around you. Can you smell how fragrant it is, Miss Granger? Can you taste it?"  
  
The place where his fingers cut into her flesh burnt like frost bite. Her own fingers dug into the ground, cold sweat perspiring from her pores: Snape's low, beautiful voice hammering in her ears like a psychotic pendulum. "No, no and no," she forced herself to say, her voice small and shaky. "Now release me before I dismember you."  
  
Snape released her at once. Hermione was painfully aware of his gaze as she sank to the grass beside him, breathing deeply. "Don't ever, _ever_ , hold me like that," she told him. "Do you understand??"  
  
"No."  
  
His answer rang crystal-cold in her ears. Dizzy, she made herself sit, gathering her winter cloak around her body as if the warmth would grant her the power and orientation to rise to her feet and walk away.  
  
"You're misunderstanding me," Snape said.  
  
She blinked. "So what did you mean?"  
  
"I understand that I should release you- I do not understand the reason. I'd like to know why you reacted so forcefully."  
  
"When you show me a girl who enjoys being seized like that, I'll gladly exchange my bra for a corset."  
  
"In fact, I could show you several women who'd love to be seized harshly," the Potions Professor retorted. "That is not my point, though. Your reaction is what I find… disturbing."  
  
She glared at him. "There's nothing disturbing in my reaction, only in your violent approach."  
  
Snape nodded. "You are right. I was fierce when I shouldn't have been. It won't happen again."  
  
"Good."  
  
"And still- I would learn the reason for your behaviour."  
  
"Have a good time digging yourself into a hole."  
  
"You can be sure I would, Miss Granger."  
  
She watched him move into a sitting position; the calmer, shallower parts of her cognition, the ones she freed to drift when danger was near, were occupied by the sheer gracefulness of his movement. More deeply, however, she was disturbed; annoyed and helpless to realize there was so little she could do to force Snape to relate to her as his equal. And yet she knew they were not equals. _Experience has aged me beyond what is normal_ , she insisted. _But doesn't every teenager think they know best? Move, get out of your parents' house, read the humourous little placard on her bedroom door: get a job and live your own life while you still think you know everything_.  
  
She might not be his equal - yes: Snape was her superior in knowledge and experience. And Hermione was slowly beginning to realize, from the hints he was unintentionally letting slip, her superior in pain as well. But then, what was equality after all? No, it was not equality she wanted: once again, it was his recognition she wished for, and the ability to stand her ground, which grew harder every day when he turned the soil she was walking on to water, by merely challenging her intellect in a way had never been challenged before. No, she was not his equal - not yet, though she knew she would be. She did not want to be his equal at the moment. She wanted to enjoy the luxury of a companion who could match her intellectually: a male companion at that. She wanted to crucify him and lick the blood oozing from his wounds. She wanted to sleep with him as an act of ownership.  
  
"We should be on our way back to the castle," Snape's low, rich baritone cut into her line of thoughts.  
  
"Oh… right." Fumbling, she stumbled to her feet, hurriedly moving her hands through her hair in a pathetic attempt to put it in some order.  
  
"Shall we?"  
  
"Sure."  
  
  


* * *

  
  
She was miserably late for their next meeting: her calendar was full as it was, with a long, exhausting training session the other night and a suspicious Harry, who took notice of her wish to go to bed early, and probably kept the knowledge for later use. Snape, Hermione observed a bit venomously, seemed to be fond of the oddest hours, like an exotic plant whose blooms open only with the first light of dawn.  
  
"You're late," he greeted her, already roaming barefooted between his Stones. A tall, magnificently phallic figure amongst the feminine, stony avatars.  
  
"I'm sorry," Hermione mumbled. "I didn't have much sleep yesterday. I failed to wake up in time."  
  
"See that this mistake doesn't repeat itself."  
  
"It won't."  
  
Dew was a thin, glittering film of moisture covering the skin of his feet, which were sunken in the high grass. She was fascinated by the way the stems bent to embrace each foot, protruding from between his long, pale toes; the hem of his robe shadowing the grass.  
  
"Care to elaborate?"  
  
Hermione shrugged her shoulders.  
  
Snape nodded. She thought she might have detected a hint of approval in his stare. "To the day's work, then. Learn your French, learn your History. There are three cycles in the Irish mythology- the Mythological cycle, comprised of successive settlements of early Celtic people on Ireland, particularly the Tuatha Dé Danann and the Milesians. The Ulaid Cycle deal with the reigns of Conchobor of Ulaid and Medb of Connacht, particularly the warriors of the Red Branch and its greatest hero, Cú Chulainn. And The Fenian Cycle - or the Ossianic Cycle - supposed to have set in a more peaceful time of the reign of Cormac the Airt, particularly the warriors of Fianna and its greatest hero, Finn Mac Cumhaill…"  
  
Wrapped in her well-padded winter cloak, she sank into the grass, satisfied to be listening to Snape's voice pouring over her with the same punctiliousness and care of the sunrays smoothed by the greyish clouds. She once heard some Slytherin girls describing their Head of House's voice as velvety: listening to Snape's clear, illuminating baritone she couldn't agree less. Velvet was dark and thick and murky: like blood that had been left to congeal. _Oh no_. Snape's voice was like snow melt, flowing cool, clear and pure from up in the mountains come spring.  
  
He kept talking, first counting the few original Druid texts left unharmed, then telling her about the Bards' system of cataloguing and remembering all the information they had to know.  
  
"Do you remember a Bard's repertoire by heart?" she inquired.  
  
"I am no Bard," Snape retorted, stopping for a moment to look at her.  
  
"Yet you remember all this."  
  
"I do."  
  
"Isn't it a bit useless?"  
  
"Tell me, Miss Granger-" Snape glowered at her. "If you were to hold a lump of butter to a candle flame: what would happen?"  
  
She scowled, but answered his question. "It would melt, of course."  
  
"So now it's a sticky, oily liquid, right?"  
  
"Right."  
  
Snape nodded. "Quite different from the relatively solid lump of butter you had."  
  
"Yes, so?"  
  
"Would you still call it butter?"  
  
"Of course!"  
  
"Why? It is not the same. The oily liquid does not have the same qualities of the solid lump. Surely, it is no longer butter."  
  
She moistened her lips. "All right, you can stop now, I get you."  
  
"Tell me, then. What do I mean?"  
  
"I would know it is butter because I watched the historical occurrence, or have evidence of the melting process, or otherwise know it had occurred in the past, and so, know what result to expect. This is butter because I _know_ it is butter: because a past event recognizes and defines it as butter."  
  
Snape nodded. "It is our past that determines who we are: not the form in which we appear," he lectured. "This-" and Snape indicated his body, "is only an empty shell. A storage room for memories."  
  
"Yes, yes," she yawned, tired of his endless brandishing of knowledge. "The superior, brilliant Snape strikes again."  
  
He stopped dead on his course. "Do you mock me?"  
  
"What?" Hermione asked humourously, failing to detect danger. "The way you mock me eighty percent of the time?"  
  
"I said- do you mock me?"  
  
She frowned; uncomfortable with the monochromatic edge Snape's voice took; slowly moving herself to a kneeling position. Carefully, she crawled toward him in the whispering, moistened grass. Dew soaked the fabric of her winter cloak, staining her jeans and wetting her palms- on which she supported herself as she made her way toward her mentor's towering figure.  
  
She was then kneeling in front of him, her face on a level with his groin: _wonder if the original prayer position was born out of the image of a woman giving head to a god; mouth open to embrace his protruding, divine phallus, arms raised to fondle the sack of his deific balls_ \- wasn't there a religious exultation in the pleasure of orgasm, and wasn't she, crouching on her knees in front of him, the Goddess who - with the touch of her lips - killed and once again gave birth to the God. Small wonder, then, small wonder that hundreds of years later, mentally-castrated male monks kneeled in front of their mentally womb-less virgin, incapable of licking her into orgasm.  
  
"Am I mocking you?" Hermione asked quietly, lifting her eyes to meet Snape's frosty gaze as she stopped at his feet. Once again, she sat on the grass, knees folded under her body as if in prayer. Frowning, she twisted her fingers in the dew-soaked hem of Snape's robe, uncovering a long, graceful foot. Angling an eyebrow, she outstretched her hand, index finger brushing the edge of a pale, cold toe. "Now am I mocking you, Professor?" she asked rhetorically, her heart swelling when he didn't flinch or retreat. "No, I do not mock you," she continued, "even though you do annoy me at times. Truth is you humble me. Annoying as you are… you humble me."  
  


* * *

  
  
"Are you mad?" she found herself asking, one evening not long after Advanced Potions was over. "There is no way I'm going to fast for a whole week. Samhain or not."  
  
"One point from Gryffindor for disrespect," Snape growled. "Now, Miss Granger. The ancient rite says you should fast, and therefore, if you wish to take part in the rite, _you shall fast_."  
  
Hermione's jaws clenched. Breathing deeply, she took out her anger on the next cauldron, scrubbing the metal until her knuckles ached. The seventh years' Advanced Potions class was working on some complex Potions where even the smallest trace of magic worked into the metal of the cauldron by a simple _Scourgify_ could ruin the potion. To Snape, she assumed, it occurred as a brilliant opportunity to kill two birds with one stone: having some time to spend with his apprentice, as well as someone to help him scrub the damn cauldrons. It was a good idea- she had to grant him that, as at least Harry, who was the sharper of her two best friends, noted the sudden addition to her timetable. Although he didn't say a thing, Hermione knew that the Boy Who Lived was perfectly capable of using the information in order to manipulate her. _Two lions with a snake's weltanschauung_ , she mused, _and I'm apprenticing with the Alpha Snake. How appropriate_.  
  
The Head of Slytherin house was momentarily bent over a large, iron cauldron, sleeves rolled up to expose a pair of delicate, sinewy arms. His brow furrowed in concentration, he had been diligently scrubbing the leftovers of a thick brew from a heavy metal side.  
  
Angry at herself for being distracted by the man, Hermione forced herself to concentrate on the persona: infuriating, arrogant, brilliant. And yet, easier to deal with. Hermione took a calming breath. "I'm on training program," she told him. "I'm practicing rather tasking sports. There is no way I can fast for such a long time."  
  
Snape merely shrugged. "Then determine your list of priorities."  
  
She gritted her teeth. "Do you have any idea why I'm training? Any idea at all? Or do you simply think I'm a sports freak?" Angered, she scraped away an extremely nasty root which somehow had stuck to the cauldron's side. "We have an enemy to beat. We better be in shape when it's time to beat it. You don't just win a war starving yourself into a state of weakness."  
  
Snape answer was cold and moderated as ever. "It is not your duty to fight the Dark Lord."  
  
"Bollocks."  
  
"Two points from Gryffindor for language."  
  
"You know damn well it's Harry's duty to defeat You-Know-Who. And I'm Harry's friend. We Gryffindors don't abandon a friend in battle. Not to mention that I hardly think Professor Dumbledore is expecting Harry to beat He Who Must Not Be Named all by himself. The Headmaster surely knows we will have a part in it."  
  
She was surprised to see Snape's movements slow considerably- his brow knotting. "You are right to assume," he said, "that the Headmaster has certain expectations of you. Even so, it doesn't make beating the Dark Lord your duty to shoulder." The Potions Professor appeared uncharacteristically grave as he looked at her. "Hypothetically, if you and Potter wanted to, there are ways for you to… disappear. Do you understand, Miss Granger?"  
  
Swallowing hard, she looked at him. "Are there?"  
  
Snape's eyes merely flickered. "Indeed, there are. So if Potter ever tires of being the Wizarding World's boy wonder…."  
  
"And what would Professor Dumbledore say to this?"  
  
"I daresay we'll find out in due time." Snape cleared his throat. "But- we are straying from the subject. We were talking about-"  
  
"-Fasting," Hermione completed. All too soon, the severe expression was gone; replaced with its softer, lighter version which still held a tint of amusement if one knew where to look for it. She didn't want it to be gone, though- she had not yet finished her search of his features. Had not yet managed to determine whether he actually cared; was it only her imagination, or did she really see sorrow in his eyes? This is not good, she thought angrily. _He is too much like taunting, too much like bantering. Giving in a little and then pulling away_. It was impossible to be sure, under such attention, whether it was Snape she was actually interested in, or the enigma of him: the mere form of presentation that tempted her keen mind to solve him.  
  
"Fasting," Snape agreed, disconnecting her flowing ribbon of thoughts with the sharp clink of his voice. He was doing that a lot lately.  
  
"A seven days' fast," she corrected. "An extremely unhealthy practice. Come on, just look at you. If a seven days' fast is a habit of yours, no wonder your general state of health is so poor."  
  
"Excuse me?" Snape asked in a deadly tone.  
  
"No, you excuse me," she said, heatedly. "You expect me to sleep with you, and yet you force yourself into some kind of bizarre diet seven days before the ritual: a diet that is only likely to make you oily, thin, weak and unstable. That is, instead of eating properly and fasting a day or several hours before the ritual, like normal people do."  
  
"Miss Granger!" Snape roared. "Do you wish to _teach me_ , or _learn from me_?"  
  
She threw up her hands in exasperation. "I have the utmost respect for Druid tradition, but I also have some knowledge about diet. You told me yourself that your ritual is a mixture of old and new- that what you practice is what works best for you. Why is this sudden narrow-mindedness?" Hermione asked angrily.  
  
"You are correct," Snape replied frostily. "My rites are what work best for me and that's why I adhere to them. You, however, pretend to know the method that I use is unhealthy, and so, disqualify it without ever having tried fasting my way." His lips thinned into a sharp line of bitterness. "You claim my general state repulses you: feel free to leave. There is the door."  
  
Her eyes narrowed; she was suspicious, although - when contemplating the matter retrospectively - Hermione didn't know why she should have felt suspicious, having hurt her Professor. Perhaps because being hurt wasn't at all like him. It made her feel powerful- a sense of power that faded at once, when she realized Snape had indeed expected her to leave. It angered her; that he would be hurt so easily - give her such power over him without even the smallest effort on her side. He was supposed to be _her_ demigod: to master and order her around and so enable her to fight him off. It was _her_ role to be hurt and angry. And then, she just didn't want him hurt. Period.  
  
Hermione blinked, annoyed; unsure how she should handle the man. "Idiot."  
  
"Five points for language."  
  
She ignored the sting. "I didn't say your general state repulses me."  
  
"Really? Shall I repeat what you-"  
  
"No need to," she cut him off sharply. "You'd only put words in my mouth and I'm no match to you when it comes to demagoguery. If I thought you were repulsive, there would be no way you could get me into the sack, ritual or no ritual, and that's the end of it."  
  
"Are you suggesting I'm trying to bed you?" _Good, he is amused again_.  
  
"I'm not suggesting anything," she told him. "And this bloody cauldron is clean."  
  
A moment later he was at her side, inspecting her work.  
  
"It's clean," Hermione insisted.  
  
"There's a spot over there."  
  
Snorting, she lifted the scrub brush and rubbed off the latest fruit of Snape's imagination. "Happy?"  
  
"Yes." And with that, he placed another filthy cauldron in front of her.  
  
Hermione watched the tacky, gooey residues of the potion one of her classmates brewed pool at the bottom of the cauldron; then looked at her hands, already dirtied by the work she was doing. She shuddered.  
  
Snape, who noticed her reaction, was instantly gone. Irritated, Hermione watched him watching her from where he now stood at the end of the classroom - all the while scrubbing a filthy cauldron. Twenty minutes later, the damn thing was clean, and Hermione wanted to throw up. Snape, who had been standing beside the washbasin, was currently tuning the water's temperature. Slightly cranky as ever, he called her over.  
  
"What now?" she barked, irritated.  
  
"Give me your hands."  
  
She stretched out her hands, her lips parting in a silent cry - Hermione wasn't sure whether it was a cry of surprise or indignation - when he enveloped them in his larger, strong hands. Warm, soft water poured over her abused skin - gently: the way the sun slowly evaporates the dew encrusting the grass stems - while Snape's skilled, clever fingers caressed the filth from her hands. She let her eyes close, to better absorb the sensation that was all touch and skin and the light trickle of water.  
  
"Now, about that fast…" Snape's voice echoed in her ears.  
  
 _Using Slytherin tactics_ … distracting her, then moving directly for the jugular. "Bastard," she swore. "Not a chance I'm going to starve myself for a whole bloody week."  
  
"Three points from Gryffindor."  
  
"I'll fast the day before the rite. I suggest you do so, too. I can work out a diet for you, if you'd like."  
  
"And what do you know about diets?" Snape drawled.  
  
"I have made it a study," she said. "I am seeing a dietitian and a personal trainer over the holidays. I am very careful with my nutrition and training- just in case you were wondering."  
  
He nodded. "Thorough."  
  
"Yes. Would you consider my method, then?"  
  
"Perhaps."  
  
"You'd be surprised to learn what the right diet can do for you," she said enthusiastically, pretty much the way she once told Harry and Ron.  
  
"And then…" Snape seemed to reconsider, "maybe not."  
  
" _Prick_."  
  
"Three points from Gryffindor."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> * "Learn your French, learn your History" - Bertold Brecht, "1940".


	12. Samhain

_notice the convulsed orange inch of moon  
perching on this silver minute of evening  
  
We'll choose the way to the forest -- no offense  
to you, white town whose spires softly dare.  
Will take the houseless wisping runs  
of road lazily carved on sharpening air.  
  
Fields lying miraculous in violent silence  
  
fill with microscopic whithering  
. . . (that's the Black People, chèrie,  
who live under stones.) Don't be afraid  
  
and we will pass the simple ugliness  
of exact tombs, where a large road crosses  
and all the people are minutely dead.  
  
Then you will slowly kiss me  
  
  
\-- e.e.cummings_  
  
  
  
"Miss Granger. You will remain after class."  
  
Her lashes flicked up from the cauldron, where she was stirring the potion for the lesson. "Yes, Professor Snape." Snape could see the glances from her guardian boys, but turned his back and returned to his desk.  
  
When the class was empty, he turned to her. He could feel excitement thrilling through his veins, and wondered how he looked to her, if he was adequately controlling his reactions or if she could tell how much he was looking forward to this night's celebration.  
  
It was the end of the school day, Halloween, Samhain, and together they would waken the stones and call down the Needfire. And, he thought, nearly trembling, they would **be** together.  
  
She was carefully packing her schoolbag. "Happy Halloween, Professor," she said. Her lifted glance caught him speechless a moment, when she continued in a murmur, "And blessed Samhain to you."  
  
"Miss Granger."  
  
"Yes?"  
  
"A small reminder. You are aware that at any point you may return my book, and this apprenticeship will end. If for any reason you --"  
  
She cut across his words. "What is the schedule for the evening? I'm assuming we want to be in the Circle at sunset, sir?"  
  
Snape fought the strong urge to clear his throat. "You realize we will not be attending the Halloween Feast in the Great Hall. Our absence will likely be noticed, but I doubt there will be visitors to our Circle this night. Go now to your rooms and bathe thoroughly. I shall do the same. Then, meet me here. There are certain cleansing rituals we will undergo before we go to the Stones." A quirk of her mouth drew his attention. "Something amuses you."  
  
"Yes."  
  
"You'd better share it, then. I don't care to be the butt of your jokes, Miss Granger."  
  
The smile deepened for the briefest moment. "I was wondering if I'll finally see you in your loincloth, sir."  
  
Snape felt his eyebrow wanting to climb into his hair. "Frankly, yes," he said now, slowly, moving to stand close. "Will there be a problem, Miss Granger? We'll be naked, or nearly so, before each other, here in this classroom, as I believe I have mentioned before." _Oh, Hermione_.  
  
"And the other thing I was thinking," she said quietly, looking down at his hands, "was that I'm...glad...you agreed to teach me these Druid ways."  
  
He fought for breath for a moment. "Very well then. I shall be waiting for you here. Don't delay."  
  
She turned to leave. He stopped her once more as she was almost to the door. "Miss Granger." He moved to stand close again, and touched her red right hand with just one finger. "Soap and water will be enough. No scraping, no clawing, just soap and water."  
  
A blush darkened her face, but she nodded, tensely.  
  
  
  
She was prompt, returning with damply curling hair and smelling of soap. Snape, his own hair damp, was setting out the appurtenances of the ritual when the door wards clicked open: oak water, the bowl, his sickle, this night's offering of fragrant autumn fruit and vegetables, two small white stones of different shapes, his clothing, the feathered cloak, and the clean, white woolen robe, rope belt and hooded cloak he'd had made for her in Hogsmeade several days prior. She set her schoolbag down at her usual place in the classroom and came forward, looking at the clothing.  
  
"For me?"  
  
"For you."  
  
Hermione Granger stretched a finger towards the robe, biting her lower lip. Snape could see the longing in her to touch the cloth, and knew she was thinking about her red hands; thinking they were unclean. This past week they were not so raw as they had been, but they were still red and rough. Her finger twitched back, into her fist. He sought to break the tension.  
  
"I have not yet told you about the stones," he said. "It is an old Scottish legend. At Samhain, many villages built their own bonfire for the celebration. Those villagers who participated would choose a stone, one they would recognize later, and give it to the fire. And afterwards, legend tells us that when the fire was burned out, the villager whose stone was different, or misplaced, or cracked, for example, would be the next one taken in the Spring rite, to shed blood, to make the land fertile."  
  
"A gruesome lottery."  
  
"Yes. Nonetheless, I thought we might each place a stone into the Needfire, by way of honoring tradition, though neither of us will be slaughtered come Spring."  
  
Her brow arched, and she chose a stone, the smooth rounded one, leaving the pointed, jagged one for him. "There. I prefer this stone. What next?"  
  
"I have no loincloth for you, yet," he said. "The right sort of wool was not immediately available for so intimate a garment. You'll have to make do with your own underthings." He felt a smile wanting to tug the corner of his mouth upward. _Stupid, to smile about seeing you in your underthings,_ he thought, but he continued to picture her in his mind.  
  
She huffed out a short, sharp laugh. "Fine. I'll make do."  
  
"Shall we begin?" There was a long moment of absolute clarity in which he held her gaze with his. _Say yes. You should say no, but say yes._  
  
She nodded.  
  
"Please ward the door, then." He waited while she waved her wand, then he turned his back on her and stepped aside, undressing slowly. He folded each article of clothing carefully and stacked it on a nearby table. Behind him, he could hear rustling that told him she was doing the same. He closed his eyes a moment, naked, breathing deeply, waiting to master himself. He could not feel this way, not like a randy teenager, and celebrate the rites properly. _It isn't about the sex, Snape. Try to remember that._  
  
Under control at last, he moved to the lab table and opened the oak water flask, pouring water into the bowl. Hermione moved to stand next to him. Out of the corner of his eye he could see her silky scraps of underwear, palest petal pink bra and matching knickers. He wanted to turn and simply gaze at her.  
  
"Do as I do, and speak as I speak, Miss Granger." He dipped his hands, one at a time, into the bowl. "Normally I do not speak these ritual words, since it is just myself to hear them, but it is also appropriate for them to be spoken aloud, especially since we will celebrate together. Let the droplets all run from your hands back into the bowl; this oak water is not to be wasted or spilled on fallow ground."  
  
Snape waited while Hermione dipped her hands into the bowl. Her poor, sore hands, with the red, raw skin trailing raggedly up to her elbows. _Merlin. If nothing else, let this ritual help those hands. This self-abuse must stop._ On impulse, he reached a second time into the bowl and gently and carefully used the oak water on her arms. Her eyes closed briefly as he touched her. _Will she weep again?_ And while he bathed her arms, he looked her body up and down. Small breasts, in their silky pink, nipples erect in the chill of the dungeon, and probably also because she was excited. _I want you to be excited_. Her flat belly, little muscles smooth there, inviting a touch or two or twelve -- a very fit young woman. Deceptively narrow hips; in actuality, very womanly in their curve and the jut of hipbones above her knickers. A navel, deep and cupping, that he would want to explore with his mouth. He felt himself beginning to be aroused, but a sudden, ugly thought quenched almost all desire instantly.  
  
 _The weasel has had her, he's slept with her. He's seen her nakedness._ While something in him was relieved she was not a virgin and therefore he would not have to take painstaking care of her, physically, at the Circle soon, another part of him was ferociously jealous that she was not his alone, to deflower in his personal church.  
  
 _Stop it, Snape. To the ritual. Prepare yourself, and her, for what is to come. You owe her that much._ Once again he felt he had mastered himself. He spoke.  
  
"Say this with me: Hands, my works."  
  
"Hands, my works."  
  
"Cleansed."  
  
"Cleansed." Her voice trembled and he saw her bite her lip to gain control.  
  
He was moved, despite himself. "Make me believe it, Hermione," he said huskily. "Say it again. I don't believe you, not yet."  
  
She swallowed. "Cleansed." Her voice was steadier this time.  
  
He lifted the bowl and poured the barest handful over the crown of her curly head, then gave her the bowl and bent his head for her to do the same for him.  
  
"Head, my thoughts. Cleansed."  
  
"Head, my thoughts. Cleansed."  
  
Snape cupped some of the water and dribbled it over her chest, fighting down his reaction, the miserable urge to take hold of her, as he watched the water trickle between her breasts in their pink brassiere and down her flat belly. She repeated his action, slowly. He wondered if she was looking only at his chest, or if her gaze was drifting further down. He wanted her to be pleased by what she saw. It was important that she not find him repulsive.  
  
"Heart, my will. Cleansed."  
  
"Heart, my will. Cleansed."  
  
He drank half the water in the bowl and handed it to her. "Finish the water. It is never to be wasted, remember." She turned the bowl and drank from the place his lips had touched. Snape had to turn away to stifle his sharply indrawn breath, and used the excuse of setting the bowl on the lab table.  
  
"Mouth, my words. Cleansed."  
  
"Mouth, my words. Cleansed."  
  
Snape had never been quite so grateful for his loincloth as he was now. He wrapped it tightly around himself, knowing she was watching, and knotted it.  
  
"Sandals, now, Miss Granger," he said. "Remember the knots, and use them." When they had finished, he had her repeat: "Clothed."  
  
"And the robe, and belt. Clothed."  
  
Her hands trembled just a bit as she touched the soft white wool and lifted it over her head, but her fingers were sure as they tied the belt properly. "Clothed." She looked up at him, both of them, in their whiteness. He stepped close and lifted the heavy curling mass of her hair out of the neck of the robe, pulling it forward. The vulnerable curve of her neck, pale, downy, cried out to him for the biting touch of his mouth, hot kisses, devouring kisses. His gaze moved to her mouth, longing to feed on it, smother it with his own mouth. _Soon. Ah, soon. You are an impure priest, Snape._  
  
Snape shook his head. He lifted the hood of her cloak and settled it, just so, on her head. He had to back away a step. If he was not careful, they would never make it to the Circle, he would take her here, now, on the cold stone floor in their white robes, Samhain be damned. It took deep breaths to calm him, and she stared at him all the while, her eyes filling with knowledge of what he wanted, what she was able to do to him physically with merely her proximity, her eyes, her expressions.  
  
Angharad's cloak, swung over his shoulders. "Clothed."  
  
He threaded the sickle's thong through Hermione's belt. "And now you are prepared."  
  
"Prepared," she said quietly, lifting the sickle, running her finger along its blade.  
  
"Best put on your school robe," Snape said. "We don't want to risk being seen dressed like this if we can avoid it. We'll take them off again once we're out of sight of the Castle." He gathered up the white cloth filled with autumn's harvest, handed her the flask of oak water, and together they left the dungeon, with Hermione again warding the dungeon door behind them, and slipped out that little-used side door, escaping into the last of the ruddy light of day.  
  
At the Stones, pausing at the foot of the stone avenue leading to the Circle, Snape slid Hermione a sardonic, yet amused glance. "Let me see you take down my wards," he said. "You must have been the one tampering with them all this time."  
  
She quirked her mouth to the side. "You aren't nice about sharing," she told him. "I wanted in, so I got in. That's all. Mean-spirited of you to lock everyone out."  
  
"One point from--"  
  
She cut across him swiftly. "Are you going to be taking points for performance, tonight, _Mentor_? I'd really rather you didn't."  
  
He clamped his mouth shut, startled. She was correct; it was inappropriate, at this time, to behave as her Potions Master. "No. No points deducted tonight. Quite correct of you to stop me, Hermione." _You should call her Miss Granger._ "I put the wards up to keep those untidy Hogsmeaders out. They leave...garbage in my Circle." His lip curled in revulsion.  
  
She walked up the stone avenue ahead of him, wand out to feel for the wards, the white hem of her robe brushing the earth, the beds of her sandals peeping beneath. The cuckoo called, softly, like a bell. The sparrows, cheeping sleepily, hopped from stone to stone along with her, until the owl banked sharply to the north immediately in front of her. She, startled, flinched back and looked over her shoulder at Snape. "What are you waiting for?"  
  
"I am simply watching you, Apprentice," he said. _Yes. A better name. Create a little distance. Not my Hermione, my Apprentice instead_. He walked slowly up the avenue behind her, pulling Angharad's cloak closer to him. The twilight was chill. He thought briefly of casting a warming spell, and decided against it. The magic of the Circle should be inviolate, untainted. He recalled Hermione's words, the pool of magic, dipped into harshly by witches and wizards with their forceful wands, and perhaps more naturally by the Druid rituals, where it was summoned instead of coerced. She had an instinctual comprehension of such things, it seemed.  
  
Snape's wards tumbled swiftly before her wand and her murmured spells; it was obvious she'd had some practice at removing them. She turned, waiting for him to catch up, and they entered the Circle together.  
  
They reached the altar stone, and Snape stood on the eastern side, while Hermione took her place to the west. "Do you remember the invocation I taught you?" he asked, placing the white cloth on the altar and arranging the offering carefully.  
  
She nodded.  
  
"Can I trust you with that blade?" he asked now, almost harshly, gesturing to the sickle still slung at her hip. "Four drops of blood, only."  
  
Hermione's head came up sharply. "How dare you!" Her fists clenched at her sides.  
  
"I dare, because I am your mentor, and I want to know that you will not harm yourself while you're in my care."  
  
"I am done with blades," she said. "That was a long time ago. Never bring it up again, Professor."  
  
"Very well. A small nick, not too deep. We need only a little for the ritual."  
  
Her lips compressed into a thin line as she unstrung the sickle from her belt. They both turned to face the west, and the sun, slipping out of sight now. That last rim of crimson blossomed, tinting the Stones with bloody light. Hermione bowed her head and spoke clearly to the setting sun.  
  
"Lugh, rest."  
  
They turned back to the east then, to usher in the Halloween moon, waxing full.  
  
"Arianrhod," she said, her voice like a bell in the silence, "Welcome."  
  
Snape turned back to her, watching as she set the sickle's inner curve to the pad of her thumb, and pulled it across her skin lightly, drawing blood. _My first time, it took three tries to get it right. She knows how to handle a blade._  
  
"East, into the first of the Night." A single drop of her red blood fell into the offering, the cornucopia.  
  
"West, into the last of the Light." Another drop.  
  
"South, into the warm Spark." Another.  
  
"North, into the chill Dark." And the last.  
  
"Samhain," they said in unison. "Celebrate."  
  
Snape handed her one of the white stones. "We will place these together in the fire once it's lit."  
  
Hermione sucked away the rest of her blood as Snape had taught her. Then she looked up at him, feathery, fly-away brows arched. His turn.  
  
Snape took a wide stance, lifted his head to the darkening sky, and called for the Needfire with everything inside him. It must work, it had to work. And, as last time, he felt a cold tidal surge, swirling around his ankles, rising up his body, lifting the cloak and its dense pelt of feathers. Yes. He looked back at Hermione, saw the thin tendrils of Needfire smoke rising between them, silver in the dusk, and smiled. The cuckoo called, once and sharply. The Needfire had come at their bidding. He looked down at the food on the altar, watching the bluish Needfire slowly brighten, something like wandlight, making her ideas of the common pool of magic and their rough wands even more clear in his mind. The Needfire began slowly consuming the offering. Snape bent and placed his stone in the fire with the fruit, and Hermione did likewise.  
  
And now there was only one thing left in the rite, aside from waiting for the swirling vortex of power to calm enough for them to leave the Circle.  
  
 _Oh, but now -- now -- I cannot complete this,_ he thought, suddenly panicked. _I cannot ask this of her. We will stop. I have celebrated alone for years, there is no real need to --_  
  
Hermione walked around the altar towards him. He put his hands on her shoulders. "Thank you," he said, quietly, needing to clear his throat. "Well done." He released her and took a few steps backwards, swallowing hard. What he wanted and what he should do were at war with one another, and he would not put her in the middle. They would simply wait for the force to die back.  
  
Her brows drew together in confusion. "Professor Snape?"  
  
"We've -- completed enough of the ritual," he said, trying not to stumble over his words.  
  
Her eyes narrowed at him. "We have not completed the ritual, sir," she said firmly. She continued to advance upon him, but slowly. He stood his ground, placing his hands on his hips, glaring intimidatingly as she neared. _Predator sparrow this time, prey owl._  
  
"We have done enough. You are my student, and this --"  
  
" _I am your apprentice, Druid Snape._ " Her dark eyes challenged him, and of course, unbidden, came that memory of her in Weasley's hold, passionate and eager in that dark corridor with the satyr and the velvet.  
  
Snape turned away, walking to the edge of the Circle, where he could feel the buzzing of the vortex. His heart thudded against the cage of his ribs. "We will simply wait until the force dies back."  
  
"It looks like that's going to take a while," she said. "That's quite a pile of food on the altar." Was that humor he heard in her voice? He felt the warmth of her small hand on his arm, through his robe. She was pushing past the frenzied lashing of his feathered cloak, coming to stand in front of him, between him and the large flat stone he stood before. Her two hands moved to his chest as she pressed close, drawing his gaze down to meet her eyes. "Is something wrong? Do you not want me, now?"  
  
Snape groaned. His hands, unasked but sure, moved to the curve of her hips, invisible in the woolen robe, long fingers digging into her back. "Not want you? How could I not want you? It simply isn't possible not to want you. But --" he trailed off, staring into her eyes.  
  
Hermione let his tight fingers urge her closer, and he knew she could feel his desire for her, pressing against her pelvis. "Then complete the rite with me, my mentor," she breathed. Her hands slid upwards, linking behind his neck, pulling his head down, and he was lost, lost, lost, in the warmth and softness of her mouth. His arms went hard around her, cinching tight around her slightness, lifting her onto her toes against him. Time passed, long moments of deep kissing, learning the edges of her teeth, tasting her freshness, drawing her tongue into his own mouth with strong suction. _I want to devour you. Nothing less._ Her small gasp against his lips sent a surge of heat through him, jolting electrically from their joined mouths down his spine and straight into his cock. The harshness of his desire, the urge to throw her to the ground and... _pound himself_...into her, made him lift his head away with a cry, and push her to arm's length.  
  
And there they were in front of him, the heavy lids that lifted, languorous with desire, those dreaming dark eyes that met and held Snape's own, drew him in, swallowed his soul, or what there was of it. Not across a corridor, not playing endlessly behind his lids, not in another woman's soft bed and twining arms, but _here_. His mind reeled, confused.  
  
"No?" she said now, wiping the back of her hand slowly across her mouth, before she ran her tongue over her lips, seeking the small soreness there from the ferocity of his kisses.  
  
"No." He was shaken, weak. Her swollen lips called urgently to him.  
  
Her hands went to her belt, removed the sickle and put it into his hands, then unknotted the belt precisely, as he had taught her. "Why not? Can you tell me?"  
  
"I simply cannot do this. Must not do this. I don't know why I thought it was a good idea to begin with."  
  
"Must not -- why not?"  
  
"You are my student." His hand clenched around the handle of the sickle, reminding himself to gain control. He could sense Conscience Minerva as she clawed at the inside of his brain, demanding that he simply wait until the fire died down, and then escort this young woman back to the castle, and end this nonsense.  
  
"But you brought me here -- trained me, showed me your ancient book, bought me these robes -- so that I could play the goddess to your god, didn't you?" As she spoke, she was pulling her white robe over her head, dropping it to the ground, reaching behind her to unclip her bra, and stepping out of the whispering softness of her knickers.  
  
"Yes -- yes, goddess to my god." In his fascination with her slow undressing, he missed the sarcasm that was plain in her voice. The irony.  
  
"It's bullshit," she said to him now. "Utter bullshit. No use for it in this day and age."  
  
"What did you say?" He gaped, appalled.  
  
"I said it's meaningless. The Druids...what use are they? Where have they all gone? I think you must be the last of your kind. Unable to reproduce, or make more Druids, or even teach others this way, because there is nothing left. It's not like the earth needs my _goddess_ blood to make it fertile --"  
  
Snape's anger flared, cold against the heat of his physical longing for the wild-haired witch before him. "You are questioning my...religion," he said at last, searching for the right word.  
  
"Someone must," she said bluntly. "You're not."  
  
"But you stand there naked before me, waiting to celebrate this thinnest of nights with me in the oldest of rites. And still you say you don't believe in this, the god, the goddess, the celebration." He had a sudden vision of himself, riding her, a fist in her hair stretching back her head, exposing her throat to his golden sickle, a fountain of red blood enriching the earth. He let the sickle fall from his suddenly stupid hands, his hands, always so clever before now. _I have brought her to this_ , he thought desperately, but when her fingers went to his own belt and began to unknot it as well, he did not stop her. Conscience Minerva went screeching down his spine, but hard on her heels was the demon of desire, desire, and a need to make this young woman understand that there was power here. Something beyond what the two of them knew to be true; something more than archetypes or literature or philosophy; something even beyond magic.  
  
"I don't. They don't exist, your god and goddess. And I don't think you really believe in them, either."  
  
"Then why are you here? Why have we spent this time together?" He knew a moment of helpless rage before it sputtered into hopelessness. _The Circle lives already -- how can she doubt?_ Her fingers reached to unfasten the feathered cloak and let it fly, rising slowly moonward above them; he did not stop her. And when she helped him lift his robe over his head, leaving him in only the loincloth, he did not stop her. She stepped close to him again, pressing her breasts to his chest, warm, soft, and electrifying.  
  
"Because I find there must be **something** to it, just not this god and goddess nonsense. Something in the way you reach for the magic, pull it from its pool, create this... **force**. That's what I think we should celebrate." Her fingers touched his chest and then slid up into his hair, to twine there and tilt his face to her liking. But now Snape took the initiative away from her. His hands grew hasty and snatched her against him; he would show her the power and aliveness of his circle. There was proof here, and to spare. It only took one hand to loosen his loincloth and let it fall in a limp heap on the brown and slowly frosting grass. He knew he should have folded it with the same precision as it was put on, but there was suddenly no time for that -- no time, only urgency, and the need to prove to her, force her to acknowledge the truth of all he had shown her.  
  
He lifted her, his hands cupping her buttocks. She was small, and light, but her legs were strong as they wound around his waist. Snape bore her backwards against the stone, into that stinging vortex, leaving one of his arms behind her to protect her skin from the rough surface, while his free hand settled the hot, wet secrecy of her goddess body carefully on his shaft and then moved to dwell between them , stroking her into a frenzied clenching. He would take her here: in its rushing current. She could not help but sense it.  
  
He could feel that they were dancing dizzily, caught in the whirlpool, both of their bodies becoming part of that spin, that centripetal force. Snape thought it must be like being caught in a sandstorm; particles of energy stung every centimetre of their skins, heightening each sensation, every movement, every touch. Hermione was gasping as he thrust into her strenuously. But as he looked at her, seeing her through the shimmer of a mirage born of the Stones' force, her face changed. Her brows drew together with the hint of a frown, and her eyes met and held his. He was afraid he was hurting her, and tried to slow the frantic pace, but she shook her head at him strongly.  
  
"Don't -- don't stop -- can't you feel it?" she stammered. Her arms wound tightly around his neck, her head fell forward, her curls sheltered his face, curls that moved and breathed in that storm.  
  
And then her mouth -- oh, her mouth -- hard on his, a deep and drawing sweetness, and then a small pain as her teeth bore down on his lower lip when the two of them came crashing together, nearly falling, crying out, electric and brilliant. Snape staggered, separating his feet wider to keep upright. He pressed her back hard against the stone and groaned in the curve of her neck and shoulder.  
  
Goddess, and god, _yes, no matter how she denies it,_ and the living ring of Stones, and that deep and silvered pool of magic, all one, all filled with the rushing power, all awake and alive and astounded.  
  
And in that limning place, where it was thinnest between this world and the next on this one night of the year, he hoped that Angharad was watching, Angharad was approving, and Angharad was celebrating with them. But according to the ritual, it would not be right to call her, though Snape wanted more than anything to ask her this one question and hear her answer: _Have I done right to bring Hermione into this world of mine? Please tell me yes._  
  
Snape panted harshly, aftershocks rocking him, holding Hermione wrapped tightly to him, so tight that when she whispered in awe, "Look up," and he tried to obey, the top of his head struck her chin painfully. He heard her teeth click together, and her short breathless laugh.  
  
"What?"  
  
"Your cloak, it's flying."  
  
"It does that when it can," he groaned.  
  
"It's so high...yet...it can't escape the Circle, it's not quite free," she said.  
  
 _Neither am I,_ he thought now, gradually letting her down from his grip, letting her body slide against his, leaning his forehead against hers. _Not anymore. So high, but not free._  
  
"Did you feel it?" he panted. "That power."  
  
Her laugh was sarcastic. "You ought to know an orgasm when you feel it," she told him. "It was good, yes, but --"  
  
Her head rocked back as Snape took hold of her shoulders and pushed her away from him, staring. "What did you say to me? How can you still deny --" and with a sound that was as much growl as it was groan, through gritted teeth he said, "It is the power of the goddess, Hermione."  
  
"It is the power of magic," she corrected him, tossing her head. "No human agency creates this. No idol you could imagine can do this, Snape."  
  
"You little -- you experienced -- _this_ \--" he released her to gesture broadly to the Circle around them, "and still you debate me, you disagree, you demand proof." He could feel a helpless fury bubbling within him. He was certain, he was sure, and he had shown her.  
  
"Proof that your goddess exists," she corrected him. "Not proof that we have dipped into that pool of magic -- look around you, it's here!" There was rapture on her face as she sought to convince him. "This is what the druid way is about, surely, Snape, and not the goddess --" and then she had to stop talking, because Snape had discovered there was the thinnest of lines between desire and anger, and he had crossed it. He devoured her mouth with his, consuming her lips, dragging her against him.  
  
Snape meant to punish her in some strange way; teach her yet again; perhaps repetition would cement the knowledge in her mind. And instead, in his arms was a willing and eager woman, twining closer, pressing against him, opening her mouth to his angry assault. "Hermione," he muttered, dragging his mouth from hers. He sought her eyes, which slid from his toward the altar stone.  
  
The Needfire still burned there, much more left to consume. She looked him hard in the eye. "The ritual is complete," she told him. "Yet we have more time left." Her palms slid over his chest, to his shoulders, and down his arms to take his hands. Snape felt his anger dissipating in the face of her certainty, and when she took his hand and led him back to the altar stone, it was all he could do not to stagger in her small wake.  
  
"So we do," he replied, sinking to the ground near the stone, lying back in the frosty, spiky grass, remembering her reaction to the black earth close to her skin, bringing her down with him and arranging her on his chest. "So we do. Celebrate with me, my apprentice." His hands twined in her hair and brought her mouth to his. "Celebrate, slowly this time."


	13. Silly Notions

"All won't be lost if I'm governed by my own uniqueness  
Stop lights won't work I'll get home sound and safe regardless  
Won't deem me had if I'm led by my own rulelessness  
My fire wont quell and I'll be harm-free and distressless."  
  
\-- So Called Chaos. Alanis Morisette.  
  
  
She lay on his torso, their legs entwined. One of her hands was resting on his chest, which almost hairless, and glowing in the moonlight. Her other hand was hanging loosely in the grass, the way Snape's raven locks and some of her own wild tresses streamed down her back, to curl around the sharp edge of a whispery grass stem.  
  
October's wind was cold on her exposed skin, emphasizing the frenzied heat of those areas that rested against his body. And yet it seemed to lick away her sweat, caress her flushed cheeks in a gentle touch of scissor hands. There was a strange sensation of completion, beginning with the way her belly rounded into his flattening abdomen when she inhaled. It continued with his skin, which shone mysteriously in the light of the waning moon, and ended with the chill of the ground on which they were lying. The frosty earth seemed to melt a little in order to envelop them.  
  
Snape's breathing underneath her ear was slowly returning to normal. Once more she lifted her gaze to look at the center altar: the stack of incense on the altar was still high. He had told her to take her time. Hermione had fully intended to, though now that her initial hunger was satisfied, she felt herself slowly clench back into her notorious self-consciousness; either shy, or cynical, or both.  
  
He raised his hand, playing idly with her hair, and she sighed, angry at her indecisiveness.  
  
"Hermione? Is something the matter?"  
  
Slightly annoyed, she rose up and straddled his hips. Swinging her hair over her shoulder with a swift movement, she turned to look at him. His cock, she noted, was beginning to harden again. Curious, she shifted her position, and reached out to touch the glistening tip.  
  
"Why the smirk?" Snape muttered.  
  
She angled an eyebrow, satisfied at his reaction when she fondled his balls. "You would probably rather not know."  
  
"Well, now I do."  
  
"Remember you promised not to take points," she warned him.  
  
"Vixen. Spit it out."  
  
"At first I thought you looked larger than Ron," Hermione told him in a matter-of-fact voice. "But you aren't. I could feel it. A matter of proportion I suppose-"  
  
"You're comparing me to _Weasley_??" he roared.  
  
She rolled her eyes. "I told you you wouldn't like it. Anyway, who do you want me to compare you with? Harry?"  
  
"Did you sleep with Potter?"  
  
"It's none of your business."  
  
He glared at her.  
  
"Would you have minded if I slept with Harry?"  
  
"I thought it was none of my business," Snape said scornfully.  
  
 _Ouch. I wonder if he knows how much this tone hurts. Most probably, he does_. She looked at him with curiosity. Wasn't it the ability to master those tools he was gifted with, that she admired? _What a wonderful fuck you are, Severus Snape, and what a terrible person. Do you ever hesitate before you stab?_ "Well, perhaps I'm making it your business," Hermione told him at last.  
  
"So did you sleep with Potter?"  
  
She examined him closely, knowing that the partial darkness would allow only sharp lines and starlight sparkle; too harsh to enable one to determine gentle sways of expression. Snape seemed to be angry: a proper remuneration for the fact she should want him to care, to be madly jealous. She probably was a total and complete fool, but she would have slept with Harry this very instant if she thought such an action could make him jealous. "Would you have minded?" she asked again.  
  
His eyes were dark and inanimate in the moonlight. "I would."  
  
"Well- But that's just Harry," Hermione concluded, hating herself for allowing a trace of disappointment to play in her voice. "You despise everything that has to do with Harry."  
  
"So did you sleep with him?"  
  
She looked at Snape, horrified at the prospect. "Of course I didn't! Harry is too much like a pet."  
  
At that, Snape burst into laughter.  
  
"What's so funny?"  
  
"It's just that I've never heard the mighty Potter referred to in such a way."  
  
"You shouldn't talk about him that way," she exhorted. "He is just a boy, and very sweet, kind and vulnerable at that."  
  
Hermione was almost frightened by the venomous look in Snape's eye. "Remind me, _why_ are we talking about Potter?"  
  
"Because pillow talk is not my strongest suit. It seems like I'd either talk about school, or I'd bewilder Ron with my silly notions."  
  
"Silly notion?" He seemed to be curious.  
  
"Yeah, well," she leaned forward, smearing a bit of pre come along his slender, lovely cock. She wondered whether he'd laugh, call her a silly girl, or perhaps give her one of those enigmatic looks, which might hide a treasure of secrets underneath his heavy eyelids, or only a grave, abysmal silence. _I think I'd rather have him laughing at me_. "I told him that on the day the war is over, I'd like to walk bare breasted on Hogsmeade's main street," she said after a while, her gaze daring him to be silent.  
  
Surprisingly enough, Snape met her eyes with quiet understanding. "Like the French girl who greeted the Allies' troopers marching into conquered Paris," he completed.  
  
Hermione's face brightened at once. "Yes, yes! Exactly so. It should be-" she contemplated her words, gently stroking the erection of the man who dared to understand her. "It should be the shedding of all confinements, throwing the damn war away, the damn nicknames away. The damn fear-" Gently, she probed his knees apart, placing herself between them. "I think I'd like to suck you off. Would you mind that?"  
  
His eyebrow rose. "Why?"  
  
She bit her lower lip. "Because you understood."  
  
"I require no remuneration."  
  
"I know." She adjusted her position, sliding down Snape's hips, and licked him from the base of his cock to the purplish head. "I want to do this anyway."  
  
"What is it to you?" he groaned as she gently massaged the tip with her lips, flicking it with her tongue.  
  
Hermione raised her head to look at him. "Well, give it a moment's thought. Being a man, you can penetrate me, take me, own me. You breach me with your body. Personally I always thought that fellatio, when done right, is the closest thing to intercourse on the female side-" A flush crept into her cheeks. "You're lying helpless in front of me, I have you in my mouth, where I can close my teeth around you any moment I wish: I can give you pleasure or deny you pleasure- _I_ am in control of _you_. It's somewhat, well, it's a little like _taking_."  
  
"Humm." Apparently amused by her answer, Snape leaned back into the grass. He stared up at the dark blanket of the night sky, perforated by the tiny fingers of little children who had once stuck small firelights into them.  
  
Allowing her hair to curtain her face, Hermione leaned forward, and with one accurate movement, took the whole length of him into her mouth, flexing her laryngeal muscles to envelop Snape's erection. He gasped, and though she couldn't smile, was elated to see his famous self-control loosen as she began to make her way up his shaft, only to settle all the way down to the sack of his balls again.  
  
It wasn't an activity she usually enjoyed: giving head was uncomfortable and stressful and sometimes revolting, and left her throat sore when she wasn't careful. Nevertheless, it was a beneficial tool to keep in her arsenal, and she'd usually give Ron head at times he couldn't be pushed off otherwise. This, however, was different. She wanted to suck this man- she wanted to milk him, with her lips and tongue and the soft, velvety flesh of her inner cheeks- into bliss. She wanted to have him shatter to pieces under her touch.  
  
Snape groaned, thrusting into her mouth, and she allowed him to set the pace, adding a twist of her tongue, increasing the pressure of her throat around the head of his cock. When he lifted his hands, she was sure he was about to bury them in her hair, and decided not to protest. However, he merely moved the sweat soaked curls out of her face, tucking them behind her ears or otherwise swaying them over her back.  
  
"Hermione-" his voice was coarse and husky, deprived of its significant smoothness, and all the more beautiful in her eyes because of it. "Hermione...Merlin...stop, I'm about to --"  
  
He couldn't see the smile dancing in her eyes- she felt utterly, stupidly grateful. No reason, really, yet she did. And without ever hesitating, increased the intensity of the suction. Only moments later, she felt Snape's body arch, his testicles tightening under her skillful hand, and closing her eyes, swallowed the eely liquid that spurted into her throat. When the spasms died at last, she let go of his cock, gently licking away the last trace of semen. Wiping her mouth, she came back to lay beside him, curling against his body.  
  
The grass was cold and moist under her body; she was aroused enough not to think of all the little creatures roaming in it, as well as avoiding the thought of the dirt- the soil- the solid ground underneath this prickly cover of grass. Instead, she focused on the warm, bright body beside her; milky skin shining in the waning moon's light. _An ugly Elf_ , she thought, snuggling closer. It was bound to make him special, wasn't it? She could still taste him, not quite like Ron, but lighter, sweeter. There was no suffocating need to rinse her mouth and she wasn't completely sure she wanted to. With his essence still in her mouth, he was still somewhat hers, and she was still somewhat his. She licked her lips, ambiguously owning him by the act.  
  
"Well."  
  
Hermione frowned, the cool slide of his voice wrapping around her thoughts suddenly reminding her of her openness as to the whole ordeal, making her a little uncomfortable with everything, now that the deed was done. " _Well_."  
  
"What?"  
  
"Nothing," she murmured, unsure what she should be feeling. Ron used to thank her and she supposed it would only be customary, but then, Snape never followed the rules.  
  
"That was- exceptional," he said at last.  
  
"You make it sound like some sort of bizarre dish that was forced on you."  
  
"Silly girl."  
  
"Yes, well," she grumbled, retreating to sit with her legs drawn to her body. "Perhaps I am. I'm used to civil partners."  
  
"It was meant as a compliment."  
  
She thought she heard him sitting up, and not long after an arm was wound around her, drawing her to a masculine chest. For a moment, she was afraid, when irrationally, the arm became a wire curling around her leg; biting into the soft flesh of her neck: two figures slumped on a leather sofa, the large, masculine one enveloping the little in a bear-like hug, a strong-but-gentle hand sneaking to caress and stroke places it should never have touched. Then Snape was whispering in her ear once again, and the moment of panic was gone, allowing her to relax into his embrace.  
  
"Very well," Hermione said softly. "Thank you."  
  
"I would like to return the favour." His lips browsed gently in the curls near her ear. "Is there something you would like?"  
  
She considered his offer. "Well, it really depends."  
  
"Depends on what?"  
  
She blushed, wondering if he could feel the heat spreading over her sternum. "Well- Amm- How long before you're ready again?"  
  
"A while," he answered, apparently undisturbed by the subject. Hermione wondered whether his ease should make her comfortable too, or tickle her sensibilities, reminding her how much more experienced he was. "I'm not seventeen anymore," Snape continued. "Nevertheless, not all sex demands a cock, dear apprentice."  
  
"I know, I know," she said impatiently, angry to have her flush deepen. "The problem is- well," _damn, it doesnג€™t get easier. And I thought explaining things to Ron was awkward!_ "I don't like, well, there are certain things I don't like. It took me a while to teach Ron to do things the way I enjoyed. Then, I suspect, he received some tips from Harry, and I had to return to the basics all over again. It was downright-" _awkward? Bewildering? Flustering?_ "Tiring."  
  
"Tell me what you enjoy, then." That soft, melted-snow voice was purring in her ear, dissolving her into liquid, sticky sugar.  
  
"It's not- it's just-"  
  
"Tell me what you enjoy, and I'll do it."  
  
She swallowed, blushing fiercely. _How could any woman in her right mind resist this voice? I am pliant sugar in his arms_. "All right. I want your mouth-"  
  
"Then my mouth you shall have," he murmured.  
  
Chuckling, he lay her down on the grass, positioning himself between her legs. He kissed her inner thigh, moving along to the slope of her mound of Venus, but stopped when she cleared her throat.  
  
"Well, um-" her flush deepened even further. "Now you're messing around. You see, I'm already aroused, I don't want you to- well."  
  
Snape looked at her with a devious glint in his eyes, and she was enormously relieved to see he wasn't offended. Quite the contrary, actually. Within an instant, his lips were fastened to her engorged clitoris, sucking with fervency. She cried out, nearly arching off the ground, with only Snape's strong hand to keep her from falling- or flying- like the cloak, kept inside the Stones circle of power.  
  
"Like that?" he teased her.  
  
"Yes-! Yes!"  
  
She thought he smiled against her moistened flesh, gently biting the sensitive nub.  
  
"Fingers?"  
  
"Yes-" she moaned.  
  
At that, one long, clever finger plunged up her tunnel, immediately joined by a second. Snape's fingers, she realized, between one cry of pleasure and the next, were longer and thinner than Ron's. "Yes, oh God-! Please-" A third finger joined the other two. She threw back her head, the combined pleasure his fingers moving skillfully inside of her and a knowing mouth on her clit slowly undoing her.  
  
"Like that?" he asked again  
  
"Yes, yes, don't stop!"  
  
He didn't. And the starlight blazed in her eyes when she came; so intensely she thought she might break his fingers.

* * *

  
  
When she opened her eyes at last, the Needfire was finally lapping away the last of the incense, golden blue flames consuming the offering and leaving only roses of ash on the altar. She yawned lazily, stretching against the long, warm body at her side. Snape, she evaluated, wasn't as masculine as Ron, but rather thin and finely formed like Harry; with the same attention to small details with which a master doll-maker might imbue his creations. The sharp, unequivocal lines of bone and muscles were softened by luxurious, blue-white skin; delicate and pure. Acrid fumes bubbling from iron cauldrons could not scorch it. She thought he looked gaunt, but even in his thinness there was strength rather than fragility: even when naked, those long, well kept muscles held the same appearance of restrained power. Not pretty ג€" with shoulders too thin, spinal column too prominent and protruding hipbones ג€" but eloquent.  
  
He was moving now, not bothering to cover his nakedness, and offered his hand to her. "Come- we should wash the altar."  
  
They worked in silence: this time, he let her pour the blessed water on the Stone.  
She could see that their stones, one rounded, one sharp, still rested on the altar, but his stone was changed. The angular, yet apparently fragile tip had cracked and broken from the rest of the stone. She knew they were both looking at it, and wondered if he felt something similar to the superstitious thrill that chased over her skin like the October wind. Snape moved the two stones from the altar and set them on the ground nearby. She wondered if they were warm at all from their time in the Needfire. How could a cold flame shatter a cold stone? When she handed him the flask of oak water, silently stretching out her hands, he didn't say a word, but merely poured but the rest of the water on her arms and palms.  
  
Hermione closed her eyes, gasping as the cold water seemed to blossom into frost on her exposed skin. Trickling downward, droplets landed with a soft spatter on the Stone. Snape, noting her reaction was immediately behind her; long, tapered fingers stroking her wrists where the frigid water chilled her skin. She felt a moment of trepidation, locked between him and the stone altar, then cried out in frustration when he backed away, withdrawing his body heat.  
  
"What is it now?"  
  
"I don't know!" she cried, reaching to take his hands and place them around her waist. "Hold me."  
  
"I... should not hold you now that the rite is over," he said stiffly, releasing his hands and pulling away from her.  
  
Turning to face him, she saw him quickly corking the empty flask and retreating to pick up their clothes.  
  
"You were not supposed to sleep with me in the first place," she spat, stung beyond measure by his rejection.  
  
"The ritual requires-"  
  
"Oh, it's a great thing, this Samhain ritual; it qualifies one to have sex with one's students. Absolutely wonderful."  
  
Snape's face hardened, _or better said: emptied and turned into the blank mask he used to wear in class_. Black slates for eyes, and his sallow milieu for fabric- quite like a Death Eater's mask, or the one condemned men were forced to wear; white faced and black hearted while the Auto Da Fe's flames cleansed their soul.  
  
"Ten points from Gryffindor."  
  
She gaped. "You fucking bastard! You said you wouldn't take points!"  
  
"I changed my mind."  
  
"Good for you! I gather that I can change my mind as well and go report your behaviour to Professor McGonagall?"  
  
"Do it, and bear the consequences."  
  
"Are you threatening me?"  
  
"I'm merely stating the facts."  
  
She clenched her jaw, realizing all of a sudden that he was fully clothed while she was completely naked. _Probably got dressed while I was raging at him, the bloody prick_. At first, it made her want to hide, and instinctively, she felt her hands beginning to climb up, to cover her bare breasts. She had changed her mind with her hands mid way to her chest. Why cover what he had already seen? What she had no reason to be ashamed of? He was the one who had told her this was her truer, purer form, and while Hermione felt the urge to retreat into her clothing, she felt stronger for the knowledge that she could face him naked. There was strength in her nakedness, and she was beginning to realize that.  
  
Dropping her hands, she looked at her mentor; chased into his shell by his own nightmares, whatever they might be- she knew enough of fear and pain to know she wasn't the one to drive him away. Damn it, but she was stronger, not in every aspect, surely not stronger than him, but she was strong enough to let the frosty air rip through her layers of anger and clear her blurry vision. "Okay, okay," she said, waving her hands as if to chase away an interfering ghost. "You might be an idiot, but I'm not letting your idiocy scare me off. You should know I don't approve of this display of twisted logic- it was rather offensive, to say the truth. But I trust your judgment when it comes to other subjects and- and I know I have much to learn from you. Still- I would appreciate it if you would stop this foolish deduction of points and don't ever threaten me."  
  
"When you learn to respect me-"  
  
"Do you think deducting points would earn you my respect?" she yelled.  
  
"It certainly earns me my students' obedience," he answered frostily, calm against her heated outburst.  
  
"It earns you their fear! They obey you because they fear you, not because they respect you!"  
  
Snape's eyes flashed with anger. "Do you think I don't know that?"  
  
"I don't know! Until lately I thought not- ask me now, and I would honestly tell you I have no idea." She ran her hands through her hair, groaning in frustration. "Why is it you treat your students the way you do? Do you enjoy being an object of fear?"  
  
"I don't think that is any of your business."  
  
"No," she said. "I don't think it is any of my business either. But answer me this, do you wish to scare _me_ into obedience?"  
  
Perhaps it was the weak moonlight, but she thought she saw a slight shift of expression on his face. "I don't."  
  
"So why do you?"  
  
"Why did you flinch at the altar?"  
  
Her mouth dried. "I didn't."  
  
He stood considering her for the longest moment, but did not press the point. Still, Hermione knew he was not fooled. "Good. Now get dressed." And with that, he offered Hermione her Druid garments, turning his back while she tied the knots with shaking hands.  
  
They walked quietly to the castle and back to the dungeons, each secluded in their own walls of perspiration-stained whiteness and mournful October chill. Her breaths puffed in clouds of smoke in front of her face, smoke animals running through her messy hair and disappearing into the darkness; to run with the spirits of the dead who roamed freely this night. No goddess, only mortal woman, mortal girl, to be exact, with lips puffy from rough kisses: Lolita riding the cock of her Osiris ג€" a man who lived his past, brewed his future, bottled it, and probably lost it too, deep in the Nile, where his corporeal body once rested, together with the slaughtered babies of the Hebrew tribes.  
  
 _Melancholic again, aren't you, Granger?_ It didn't seem right that she should be despondent, she thought, while pulling her jumper over her head. She looked for her anger, and found the ever existent flame slowly consuming her coils of small intestine. Nonetheless, it was a bored fire, a doleful fire.  
  
 _Well, too much time with a cold-blooded creature could do that to a person_ , Hermione mused _. But I am not a cold blooded creature- when my fire dies out, I wither as well_. Then came the self-mutilating, when she thought it would be better to hurt, better to bleed, than to feel how she slowly died from the inside out: watching the decay and the atrophy take over her soul while the sight of blood oozing from a fresh cut was terrifying enough to boost her system into producing new red cells. That thought-- that thought was enough to enrage her. Livid, she turned to face Snape, once again embalmed in his black, forbidding teaching robes ג€" dug even farther into his shell, here in the dungeons.  
  
"We should talk," she declared.  
  
"And tomorrow we will talk."  
  
Hermione pursued her lips. "Now."  
  
"Now is not the right time," he informed her. "You are angry and out of your element. Whatever it is you have to say will wait for tomorrow."  
  
She shook her head. "No."  
  
"I said, when you entered this apprenticeship, that there would be some subjects where you'd simply have to trust my judgment. This is one of them."  
  
"Indeed, I have. But is it your judgment you apply now, or do you simply wish to avoid me?"  
  
"As I said, you will have to trust me as your mentor."  
  
She closed her eyes, breathing deeply. "Well, I don't."  
  
For the first time in her Hogwarts career, Hermione Granger saw Severus Snape flinch. It was not a harsh movement but a subtle one, obscured by the dimness of the dungeon, but nonetheless discernable. Nonetheless horrible, as it made his face ג€" his ugly, harsh, aquiline face ג€" vulnerable, for the briefest second. Then it settled, more firmly than before, into its Death Eater's mask. "Well," he began. "I suppose it means you better leave now."  
  
"I didn't say I don't trust _you_."  
  
" _Leave_ ," he ordered. Anger rose from him, almost as perceptible as steam rising from a cauldron.  
  
She gritted her teeth. "No, I won't. And you don't want me to leave, so stop being an idiot and ask me why it is I trust you but not necessarily as my mentor."  
  
"Playing games now?" He made a low sound, part hiss, part growl, and with one quicksilver move, pinned her to the dungeon wall, his hands on her shoulders. "Didn't I tell you there will be _no_ games?"  
  
She gasped, and without giving him any warning at all, aimed her elbow, watching him collapse after she hit him directly in the solar plexus. "It could have been your package as well," she spat. "Better be grateful, Professor."  
  
Straddling his hips, she rolled up his robes, swatting his hands aside when he swore and made a half-hearted attempt to shake her off.  
  
"What in the bloody hell do you think you're doing, Granger?  
  
She didn't answer, but instead, quickly unbuttoned his cambric shirt, and leaned forward to check severity of the injury. Reaching her hand, she touched the hurt area. "How does it feel?"  
  
A muscle in his jaw twitched. "How the hell do to you think it feels?"  
  
She gave him a crooked smile. "Bloody painful- nothing is damaged, though. I told you not to corner me."  
  
"I told you not to play games."  
  
"It is not the same."  
  
He let his head drop. ""It isn't the same."  
  
"How is it different? Please, enlighten me." His voice was cold and he lay deadly still. It should have been a warning to her, but she was angry and frightened and hurt.  
  
"First I'm your goddess, then I'm just a stupid schoolgirl. But in between, Snape ג€" in between, I was something else, and you know it. _You_ are playing games, as much as I am." Her aspect softened. "Now," she said, gently caressing his stomach where her elbow had struck, "I want to talk _now_."  
  
"This is unacceptable- you are not going to get away with this scheme of yours."  
  
"Aren't I?" Her nostrils flaring, she applied some pressure on his bruise, watching Snape clench his jaws.  
  
"You little bitch."  
  
"You should watch your language, Professor."  
  
"Fuck off." His eyes narrowed once again, glittering at her wickedly. There was a sensation of coiling muscle beneath her. As she knew perfectly well, he was only still because he wanted to be still. If he really wanted to dislodge her, she would have a difficult time holding him down.  
  
"I would love to," she retorted, remembering Harry's words to her, only a days ago. "I told you I trusted you, but not necessarily as my mentor-, you see, Professor, Severus," she moistened her lips, praying for the courage to say what she wanted to say. "When we-"  
  
There was a long pause, and finally Snape finished her sentence for her. "Celebrated?"  
  
She looked at him intently. "Here- here. That's my point," she poked her index finger into his chest. "We might have celebrated at first, which was fine, really- I had a great time and you were a great- celebratory? But when, what we did, afterwards- hell, ever since that night in the hallway-" she shook her head. "You were not my mentor and I was not your apprentice, and I don't want you as my mentor and I know you _want_ me- I saw you looking at me that night. I know by the way you made love to me tonight; I can tell by the way you look at me now, I can tell by this hard on I feel now. Damn you, Snape. Say something!"


	14. Aftermath

_they are  
alone  
he beckons, she rises she  
stands  
a moment  
in the passion of the fifty  
pillars  
listening  
  
while the queens of all the  
earth writhe upon deep rugs  
  
\--from stanza 3," the emperor"  
  
  
\-- e.e.cummings_  
  
  
  
"Say something? After that churlish and vile performance you want me to say something, you want me to admit you're correct in your assessment of me! You've been disrespectful, snide, physically violent --" he broke off, gritting his teeth, suddenly realizing he'd been no better than she. _Who is the adult here, Snape? Who had her pinned to the wall when you knew already her reaction might be extreme? Who wanted that reaction to flare? Who hoped to push her to that?_  
  
Her stare was mutinous and chilling, and Merlin help him, he wanted her again, she was right about that. He couldn't deny his arousal; he'd been very stimulated by her physicality. He wanted this furious little Amazon that was straddling his hips and holding him down. Every cell in him demanded that he touch her fiercely, not with violence but with all the force of the rising and urgent need in him, but would he be able to make that difference clear to her?  
  
Not only that, but of course the question remained: Should he?  
  
Conscience Minerva was firm about that, in a way she had never been before. Walk away now. **Now**. There is no other choice. You've already crossed the line; do not stay there. Send this woman-child to her room and never touch her again. Never look at her again. Never examine at close range each eyelash, each small frown line as she scowls at you, waiting for your response. The rite is over; you have no more rights to this girl. You never did to begin with, rite or no rite; religion or no religion; no goddess, and certainly no god.  
  
 _Angharad, I have coveted, and I have taken what was not mine to take. And I took it gladly, with lusting pleasure. I have abused my knowledge and my position to gain what I wanted. And Merlin help me, I want to do it again._  
  
His chest heaved on an indrawn breath, a long breath, and somewhere inside him a bubble arose, a quote from years past. Martin Luther, speaking clearly, and out of context, and Snape echoed the words aloud as he took rough hold of this girl, lifting his body, taking her swiftly beneath him and settling himself between her thighs, doing as he'd imagined himself doing for weeks, rocking his erection against the seam of her jeans, dropping his mouth to kiss her hard, pulling her hands away from him and taking the wrists in the fingers of one long hand, to imprison them over her head against the cold floor. She would have the answer she wanted, not verbally, but clearly from his body.  
  
"Sin boldly," he muttered against her mouth. _Conscience Minerva: get thee behind me._  
  
"Martin Luther," she muttered back, biting his lower lip, and releasing him only to draw his tongue into her mouth.  
  
"Damn you, is there nothing you haven't read?" He was pushing up her jumper to expose her tender flesh to his hands, his mouth, his greedy eyes.  
  
"Nietzsche. He was boring and supercilious. And this floor is fucking cold. Treat **me** with respect, take me somewhere warm, Snape, and admit that I was right: you want me, and you think you should not."  
  
"Yes, _**fine**_ , I want you, ritual or not, Needfire or not, Samhain or not. Now shut your mouth. Or rather, open it, but don't speak."  
  
Her hands pressed upwards against his chest. "No. I told you, someplace warm."  
  
Snape muttered a warming spell, and suddenly she began to laugh beneath him. "And someplace softer," she said.  
  
"All these bloody conditions!" He was close to yelling, but he struggled to his feet and hauled her up after him. "Gather up your things."  
  
"Where are we going?"  
  
Snape stared at her. "Where do you think?" He vanished into his office, to put away his own robe and the cloak, the sickle, flask, and water bowl. When he returned to the classroom, she was standing with her robes bundled into her arms. Her schoolbag hung from her left shoulder. She looked flushed, her hair mussed, but her eyes were alert and bright. She hadn't taken the opportunity to sneak out of the classroom while he was busy in his office. "Come with me." Snape led her quickly through the corridors to his quarters and ushered her inside, warding the door afresh. No one had been about, for which he was profoundly glad. _Doing the wrong thing, here, Snape._  
  
Inside, he took her robes and placed them over the back of a chair near the fireplace. He held out his hand for her schoolbag and set it next to the chair. Hermione looked around herself with interest, and for a moment he saw his dark and tidy rooms through her eyes; he thought they would pass inspection. He held out his hand to her. She looked at it suspiciously.  
  
"What?" she said.  
  
His brow arched; was she chickening out? "Some place warm, and softer," he said. His erection had begun to flag in the intervening minutes since the struggle in the dungeon, but he felt sure that could be remedied. There was a long moment in which she considered the pale palm of his upturned and outstretched hand. _She has changed her mind_ , he thought. But then he remembered the girl in the Circle, so much **not** his apprentice after that first blinding, whirling, astonishing sex experienced inside the actual flow of energy within the ring of Stones, and did not think she would back down from anything, much less this. Her eyes lifted; she met his gaze.  
  
"Lead on," she said, but did not put her hand in his. Snape turned and walked into his bedroom, where his bed, his **bed** , his _**bed**_ awaited them, its green hangings dim in the lowlight. He heard her following him quietly.  
  
He pointed his wand at the fireplace and the logs there caught fire. When he turned back she was already half undressed, shoes kicked off, jeans over a chair, one foot in her hand as she struggled to drag off a snug sock.  
  
"No," he said. "Stop. Not so fast."  
  
She froze, and he surprised a moment's uncertainty and discomfort on her features. "What do you mean, Professor? Aren't we here to --"  
  
He leaned his head down, so he could whisper directly into her ear, his breath stirring her curls, and spoke silkily. "Absolutely. But on my terms this time. Not a mindless fuck, Hermione. My rooms, my rules." Looking down at her one bare foot, Snape could see that her toes had curled. _Good, very good_. But when he lifted his head and looked at her face, she still had that discomfited expression. He continued, more coldly: "If you want just a shagging, then leave now; go find Weasley and relieve any stress you may be feeling."  
  
"I already told you...messing around...it doesn't turn me on...or arouse me."  
  
"It will," he whispered. "Oh, it will, before I'm through with you." He thought he saw a small shudder ripple over her skin. He took her by the shoulders and steered her towards his bed. "Sit. Allow me."  
  
She sat on the edge, facing him, staring at him as he knelt in front of her and took her sock foot in one hand, and slowly peeled back the anklet, looking up into her eyes. "We start with the small things. Far away from...let's just say, the major battlefield."  
  
"Battlefield." She snorted at him.  
  
"Mmm, yes. The theater of operations, if you prefer. Your foot is cold." He took it between his hands and whispered the smallest of warming spells to his palms and fingers. His skin would warm hers. He began to massage her foot, working the ball of the foot with his thumbs strongly. Her eyebrow rose as he looked at her. Without speaking she brought her other foot up and placed it against his shirt front. He attended to it as well. She had strong feet, with high arches and tender, slightly ticklish soles. When they were warmer, he began attending to her toes, each individually, rolling each toe pad between his thumb and forefinger.  
  
"This is doing nothing for me," she announced, "although my feet are warmer."  
  
"I don't believe I asked you," he retorted. "Who is doing the seducing here? Is it you?"  
  
"I just don't feel...very seduced," she replied.  
  
"Patience..."  
  
"...is a virtue, so I've heard, but I -- oh!"  
  
Snape had run his tongue from the heel of her left foot, along the sole, up into the sensitive curve of her arch, and then along the base of her toes. Her toes curled sharply, and he nipped at those tender pads. She tried to flinch away, but he held on tightly to her foot and calf. When he took her toes into his mouth she half opened her lips, but it was to exhale a little raggedly.  
  
"Equal treatment," he murmured, repeating the actions with her other foot. She smelled of soap, and the rope and leather of the sandals she had worn for the ritual, and crushed grass, earth, and something else that was simply Hermione.  
  
"This is...strange," she told him, but he could see that her pupils had enlarged, and he knew she was maintaining a bravado that was most likely draining away.  
  
"But you like it," he murmured, sucking on the toes of her right foot. He felt them curling against his tongue, and bit down gently while he tickled the arch of her foot. She kept making small twitching movements, but was no longer trying to pull away.  
  
"I don't know if I like it or not," she said.  
  
"But you don't dislike it." Snape began slowly kissing his way up the outside of her left leg.  
  
"I suppose not, but this that you're doing now -- it's just foolish."  
  
"Weasley never attended to this little place just here," he murmured, lifting her foot to his shoulder so he could kiss and stroke the back of her knee, the tender flesh in that hollow, and nibble along the two tendons there. "Now did he."  
  
Snape had his answer at her gasp. He rose and his hands went to the tail of her shirt, to unbutton it slowly, so slowly, from the bottom, separating the two sides as he worked. Shortly he was able to pull the shirt down her arms and toss it away. She sat on the side of his bed in her little scraps of pink silk. "I think we can dispense with these now, as well," he murmured. He motioned for her to turn her back to him so he could reach the hooks of the brassiere. He was careful only to touch the cloth of the bra, and not her skin. Hermione's shoulders pivoted forward to let the bra slide down her arms as he released the catch. She turned back to look at him.  
  
"Lovely," he said, stepping back, looking at her. "Lovely."  
  
"Your turn," she said, lifting her hands to the buttons of his shirt. He stepped further back.  
  
"No."  
  
"Why not?"  
  
"Must I repeat myself?"  
  
Her eyes narrowed at him, and for a second he saw himself staring back at him. She was beginning to pick up his habits, most likely to mock him.  
  
"Lie on your stomach."  
  
"I don't trust you," she muttered. "Turning my back on you doesn't seem like the intelligent thing to do."  
  
"You do trust me," he said. "You've demonstrated that amply tonight. Now turn over."  
  
With a mutter she did as he asked, looking over her shoulder at him. Snape took hold of the sides of her knickers and slid them down and away. He sat on the bed near her hip. " _Accio_ sweet almond oil." A small blue glass bottle flew into his palm, and he opened it. He warmed some of the oil in his hands, then moved back down to her calves and began a slow massage that gradually, so gradually, moved upwards. She was still looking at him over her shoulder, propped up on her elbows, the heavy mass of her hair spilling over her back. _Beautiful, sweet, tender_ , he thought. _Something tender, with sharp teeth. An ermine, or perhaps a feral cat. Stroke it carefully or it will bite._  
  
He bent, so that his lips could precede his fingers up her body. By the time his hands and mouth had reached the middle of her inner thighs, she had closed her eyes. "That's right," he murmured to her. "Relax." He smiled, shark-like, when her legs opened ever so slightly. He ignored that small movement, adding more oil, moving over the rounded cheeks of her bottom. "Lovely here, too," he told her. "Such a sweet curve." The tips of his fingers found the sensitive places at each side of her hips, pressing there, watching her try to squirm without seeming to do so. When her teeth sank into her lower lip, Snape knew he had her.  
  
Still, he avoided all the usual places she had claimed to like having touched. He moved on to her back and spine, sweeping her hair to one side. His clever fingers found several knots in the muscles of her back, and pressed hard to work that tension out of her.  
  
"How is this seduction?" she wanted to know.  
  
"How is it not?" he asked.  
  
"There's no...sex."  
  
"We've already discussed how not all sex involves a cock."  
  
"Hmm." She was very nearly purring under his hands, he thought. He increased the pressure of his hands, stroking firmly as they moved upwards along her spine, and then more lightly on the return trip to her hips.  
  
"But we haven't discussed how the best sex involves your brain, more than your body. Think of your favorite class here at Hogwarts. And now, imagine yourself in that classroom, working out a difficult spell or equation or...potion." He leaned closer, so he could speak into her ear once again. "Something demanding, something that takes all your attention." His right hand slid carefully down her back, brushed over the sweet crease between her cheeks, and chose the left thigh to stroke down, slip towards the middle, and stroke upwards again, so very slowly. As his hand neared the moist nest between her legs, she gave a small groan and moved her knees apart.  
  
"Please," he heard her whisper.  
  
"Not yet," Snape whispered back. He was as hard as a rock, but there was still much to be done before he could satisfy that longing. "But you may turn over."  
  
"Equal treatment?" she mumbled, trying for sarcasm, but she turned to lie supine on his bed. And ah, the delights that waited for him here. Not that her back side wasn't absorbing to him; it was. But here...breasts, nipples, the cup of her navel, the hollow of her throat, the struts of her collarbones, her neck, her ears. Her lips. All would require visits from his fingers and mouth before he would even consider approaching that dark triangle at the apex of her thighs.  
  
"Hmm," he murmured, pouring more oil into his hands. He began again far from the more interesting places, at her feet, and worked his way up as before. "Are you in that class, Hermione?" Snape wanted to know which class it was she was thinking about, but decided not to ask. It was probably Arithmancy, that precise and clockwork class taught by Professor Vector. It would be like Hermione to prefer a science to an art such as Transfiguration or Potions, where creativity counted for as much as the method. In Arithmancy, method was everything, unvarying, reliable. Safe.  
  
Her eyes opened and she looked directly at him. "I am there," she said. "Cutting up those bat wings." She swallowed hard. "And you're behind me in class, taking all my attention."  
  
Snape froze. He hadn't expected that she would begin to talk out a fantasy with him. His brow moved slowly up his forehead, and he bent to explore the quivering cup of her navel with his mouth, as much to conceal his expression from her as to give her pleasure. "Am I," he murmured against her skin. "Tell me more." With the lightest of touches, and a slight change of plans, he skimmed a finger down through the curly hairs at the top of her thighs and slipped over the edge, just briefly. Her body arched upwards beneath his mouth.  
  
"You are," she breathed.  
  
"What am I doing to you, in that class."  
  
"You're just...watching."  
  
"Hmm. From behind." His mouth slid slowly towards her breasts, followed by his hand, but he found himself distracted by her ribcage and began to nibble along it towards her sternum. He was in range of her hands, now, and he felt them tangle in his hair, though she did not try to move him along faster; she simply held on.  
  
"Yes. Snape..."  
  
"What do you **want** me to do to you, in that class." Ah--here, a little sweet spot, beneath her left breast, where he could feel her heartbeat throbbing rapidly, a pulse. When his tongue swept lightly upwards to circle a nipple, he felt her flesh pebble against his lips and bit down gently. He used his teeth to caress her, and heard her indrawn breath, and then, finally, a moan of desire. A moment later his hand followed, oily, smooth, to continue that touch with the lightest of pressures.  
  
"Please..."  
  
"Please what..." He attended to the other breast similarly, which caused her to squirm beneath him, and then began the trek to another ultimate goal, the hollow of her throat, and finally her mouth. "Tell me." Snape hovered over her mouth, meeting her eyes, which were dark and heavy-lidded. "Don't be afraid of what I might think. We've gone past that now. Tell me what you want, in that classroom of mine."  
  
Her chin tilted up as she tried to bring her lips into contact with his. He lifted his head to stay just out of range. His hand skimmed downwards, finally seeking that nub, which by now was engorged and slick with her arousal. He chuckled darkly. "I thought that messing about did nothing for you. Thought it didn't arouse you."  
  
She said nothing in response because there was no point in denying her condition, but now her hands did seek to control his movements, and she used them to drag his mouth down to hers. It was electric, once again, to feel her kiss, her warm wet tongue, and the quickened rushing bellows of her breath. When she was more certain that his mouth would stay, tending to her own with fierce care, she slid her hands down to the cambric of his shirt and began to open buttons. Snape allowed her. His own hand was busy making excruciatingly slow circuits, up, down, in, around, her wet folds. Her hips thrashed, not wildly, but certainly in barely controlled movements, each time he completed a circuit and returned to dwell at that nub.  
  
When his shirt was unbuttoned, her hand proceeded to the fly of his trousers, and was even quicker there. Things had begun to proceed at an increasingly rapid pace, and Snape felt desperate to be inside her. His eyes closed when her fingers linked around the base of his rigid cock, inside his boxers, and pulled upward strongly, sliding all the way up to the throbbing, drooling head. He could not suppress a sharp grunt.  
  
Finally she dragged her mouth away and spoke into his ear, hotly, raggedly, breathlessly. "When you're behind me in that classroom, it's because you're fucking me, up against that lab table. Time for you to be naked, Snape. Get these trousers off. You've seduced me, I hope you're happy."  
  
He was overwhelmingly aroused by her fantasy, which played itself with dark, illicit excitement in his brain. He muttered a charm to rid himself of his clothing; he could not wait for her small warm hands to finish undressing him. Naked against her again at last, he settled his hips between her thighs. Her legs opened to admit him, and wrapped around him; he could feel her heels interlocking with the bend of his knees as he pushed forward, sliding into her.  
  
There was, as always, that incredible moment of the first sheathing of himself in a woman's body: hot, wet, tight, pulsing; and then there was nothing but a red haze of desire that spiraled up, up, as he pounded into her and she met his motions stroke for stroke, her legs twined around his thighs. He felt her sore red hands clutching his arse. Her face was taut and pink; the pupils of her eyes tremendous and velvet black as she stared up at him. She came within a mere minute, so very aroused; and after all the foreplay he was not far behind her, dropping his head to her shoulder, pressing his heated face into her neck to stifle his loud cries of release.  
  
He lay heavily upon her afterwards, because she would not let him slide to the side nor remove his slowly deflating cock from her body. He was exhausted, and felt ridiculously weak.  
  
After several minutes she spoke. "Well."  
  
"Well what."  
  
"This was definitely a warmer and softer place, but it's not enough."  
  
"Damnation, woman, what more do you want? I have nothing left in me this night." He did not lift his head; instead, he bit down on her trapezius muscle, running from her neck to her shoulder.  
  
"You should eat, that's all. You've probably been stupid and fasted for days. I need food, as well."  
  
Snape thought he could hear amusement in her voice. He muttered a curse and levered himself away from her, ignoring her clutching hands. "I should deduct points for your rudeness. The bath is through there," he said, gesturing. "Why don't you go and tidy yourself, and be out of sight while I summon the house elves to bring us something to eat. I'll call you when it arrives." He lifted his robe from the hook where it hung on one of the four posts of the bed. He tossed it at her. "Wrap up; the bath can be cold."  
  
"I expect you like it that way," she said, sitting up.  
  
He couldn't help looking at her as she moved towards the edge of the bed. He had marked her with his passion, faint bruises the shape of his fingers on her thighs, love bites on her neck and collarbone, and the almond oil gleamed on her skin. He moved close again, lifting the robe from the bed and putting it round her himself. It enabled him to pull her against him by its belt, and bend his head for more heart-stopping kisses. "You are miserably desirable, you warm wench," he muttered. "Go and bathe." He still wanted her, though he knew his body could not cooperate, not again so soon. **Obsession** , Conscience Minerva whispered to him, darkly.


	15. Capitulation

"You're too young or you're too old or you're simply not inclined  
You're asleep or you're withholding be that my cue to crave you."  
  
\--Bent for You. Alanis Morissette.  
  
  
She woke up once during the night, when the warm weight beside her shifted and moved out of the bed. Blinking in the almost complete darkness of the dungeons, she looked for Snape's figure drawn out in the dim candle light, relieved to find him watching her from behind the velvet drapes.  
  
"Wha' is it with you…?" Hermione mumbled. "Come back to bed… it's really cold 'ere in the dungeons…"  
  
She thought she might have seen him smiling at her, but it was impossible to tell in such darkness. His hand, however, reached for a moment, to curl in her tousled tresses. "Go back to sleep," he told her. "I'll join you in a while."  
  
And so she did, allowing her heavy eyelids to shut out the dreamy, darkened room. The soft mattress welcomed Hermione as she sank deeper; fragrant loops of warmth - still carrying his scent - wrapping around her body until she was entrapped with him.  
  
There was no telling how long she slept, only that by the time she woke up, there was light in the parlor, and Snape was sitting on a leather covered armchair in front of the mantel, reading a book.  
  
This time, when she told him to come back to bed, he put the book aside and joined her.  
  
"When is it you plan to return to Gryffindor tower?" he asked after a while.  
  
While Ron used to lie on his back with his hands crossed behind his head, his face wearing a silly expression, Snape - she noted - would withdraw into himself. His eyes would be scanning the canopy; long, beautiful fingers curled around a nonexistent object - like a babe's hand might fist in its sleep.  
  
"Do you need me to leave?" she asked, raising a little and leaning on her elbow, in order to have a better view of his face.  
  
He frowned. "I just might."  
  
"Aren't we rude?"  
  
"I'm not accustomed to sharing my bed with another person. Nor my living quarters, since we're talking about sharing."  
  
She lay beside him for a moment, not sure why she should feel so thoroughly lacerated. There had been rejections in the past, not of this sort - and Hermione did not suspect Snape of not wanting her. She was reminded of mental and emotional fencing, until one of the participants surrendered. Battlefields she entered with the intention of losing, longing for the sweet sensation of knowing her intellect had finally yielded: that she had capitulated and taken, and could now be assured that she rests in good arms.  
  
But then, those boys she had been playing mind games with… one Ravenclaw boy, early in her sixth year, then a Slytherin, a while before the end of the year exams… it was the challenge they sought - not the pliant, soft, delicate devotion she wanted to give them once she had been defeated. Perhaps, had she dared to go further, cheated on Ron… perhaps there would have been more: the challenge would have lasted, into a physical interaction, before it vanished. But she chickened out of taking it any further. And them- it was the challenge of yielding her bright spirit, her exceptional intellect to their bidding. Nothing more. Nothing more. Hermione wondered, then, flayed open, with Snape at her side, whether _he_ wanted anything more. _There is always Daddy, of course. We have our… disagreements_ , she thought for a moment, with tears in her eyes. _But Daddy is safe, Daddy is always safe_.  
  
"Hermione-" Snape was leaning over her, a look of concern floating in his dark, glowing eyes. "What is it?"  
  
"You said you wanted me to leave, so I shall leave," she proclaimed, defeated. "Just give me a minute to scrape my pride off the floor."  
  
His eyes narrowed suspiciously. "What is it?"  
  
"I didn't trust you then, and I don't trust you now."  
  
Snape growled. "I thought we were past that."  
  
"You really don't get it Snape," she drawled at him. "I'm a teenage girl, and a totally messed-up one at that. We're never going be _past that_. Though seeing you're driving me away from your living quarters, there's no 'we', so I guess it should not bother you."  
  
"You think I'm… what's that childish phrase… dumping you?"  
  
She rolled her eyes. "What else am I supposed to think? You had it your way, under your rules. _You_ seduced _me_. End of game."  
  
"Antisocial, ridiculous, silly, foolish…." Snape drew in a breath. "Is that how you treat your lovers? Is that how Weasley treated you?"  
  
Something inside her clenched and fisted, air leaking out in a whispery whoosh at the dangerous gleam in Snape's eyes. "No, no, you idiot. Ron would have never done this to me!"  
  
"Who, then?"  
  
She opened and closed her mouth, biting her lower lips. "There were two boys, last year. Nothing worth talking about, okay?"  
  
"Why you are afraid, then?"  
  
"They both were… God, you wouldn't understand!" Crying out, she turned her back to him, burying her face in the pillow.  
  
After a moment, she felt Snape's hand touching her left shoulder blade, caressing her gently, almost tentatively. "Try me, I know teenaged boys. I was one, once."  
  
She frowned, searching for the right words. "They… well. We wanted different things, I suppose."  
  
"Did they push you, Hermione?" There was suppressed anger in his voice that warmed her and frightened her at the same time. "Did they take something you weren't willing to give? Is that why you can't be cornered?"  
  
"No, no!" she protested, a bit impatient. "Men and sex! Is there anything else you are capable of thinking? I have no doubt they wanted sex, too. But that was not the thing. We'd battle intellectually. Emotionally. Fight for dominance. They won, in the end. Whether because… they bested me, or I'd let them win. I guess I wanted them to. Wanted to have someone better than I, whom I can… yield to. Then they got tired of me, and stalked off. I was left capitulating and pliant and craving and they… just- evaporated. I was no longer challenging, you see. Quite like the morning-after concept, I suppose… so tell me, Snape…" She was suddenly in a hurry to change the subject. "Did you ever break a girl's heart once she gave you what you wanted?"  
  
"You're straying from the subject," he said, reaching to turn her over, so she would face him. There was no expression in that elfin, ugly face of his, but the eyes were dark and intense.  
  
"I know. But I've entrusted you with one of my secrets now. You should give me one of yours in return. Ron would go nuts if he'd known I… contemplated other boys while I dated him."  
  
"Dated?" Snape seemed… surprised? Relieved? Angry. "I didn't know you two ever stopped dating."  
  
"So who is straying off the subject now?" she retorted, then sobered. "We broke up, several days ago."  
  
"Which is probably the reason you looked so sated and well shagged Tuesday morning in the Great Hall?"  
  
Hermione lifted a brow. "I didn't know you were watching me."  
  
"I wasn't."  
  
"Yes, right, whatever you say, Professor. Anyhow, I broke up with Ron on Monday night."  
  
"So it is a habit of yours to sleep with your former lovers?"  
  
"Jealous, Snape? No," she put off the notion hastily, before he could object. "Of course you wouldn't. You wouldn't be staring at me, well shagged and all, in the mornings in the Great Hall, or be turned on, watching me snogging with another in the hallway- Snape, Severus," she felt her mouth dry, her tongue turning into clay inside her mouth. "I don't think I can stand it when you look at me like that. I think… I think…" she stuttered, her pulse racing, "I think that my heart might be breaking, or I'd be tempted to cut myself because it's too bloody much… no, hell, I won't do it, but you frighten me, you freak me out, do you hear me, Snape, you bastard!"  
  
At that, he dropped on the mattress beside her; his eyes, once again, trailing on the velvet canopy. "I want one thing clear between us," he said quietly, his voice so deadly calm she couldn't believe the calmness to be true. "While we are together, there will be no other lovers, of either sex. If you think you can stand that, you may come back here. If it's too difficult for you, go and don't come back."  
  
She felt the anger building inside her, into a small eruption. "Do you take me for a cheat?"  
  
"You just admitted contemplating cheating on your boyfriend."  
  
Hermione nodded. "True enough. You didn't tell me, though. Did you ever break a girl's heart, after taking what you wanted from her?"  
  
Snape seemed to be amused. "No," he said at last. "Who would fall in love with the greasy git?"  
  
"Well," Hermione began as she slid from the bed, slowly moving to pick up her clothes. "You'd be surprised."  
  


* * *

  
  
"Ron and I missed you at the Halloween feast," Harry told her once she sat on her bed in her Head Girl's room, _Le Monde_ in one hand and a saucer supporting a tea cup in the other. The messy haired boy had knocked on Hermione's door only a few minutes after she got out of the shower.  
  
"I had… more pressing matters," she replied.  
  
"Like being thoroughly shagged?"  
  
She glared at him.  
  
"You have love bites. On your neck. And on your collar bone. And there's another one, just below your ear. And some scrapes, too. And of course, there's the sex look," Harry explained, sinking on the bed beside her. "Better start practicing concealment charms."  
  
Crookshanks, who had been pushed aside from his favourite hollow at the edge of the bed, attempted to bite Harry's ankle, then resettled himself between Harry and Hermione.  
  
Her glare deepened. "Oh! Just look who's talking! The Boy Who Lived To Be Miss Anonymous' Marked Property! There's that love bite on your neck all over again! Why don't _you_ conceal it?"  
  
Harry's lips tightened and his hand reached to stroke the reddened skin. "I happen to like it to show," he replied. "You, on the other hand, would not like Ron to know you're shagging someone else so shortly after breaking up with him."  
  
Hermione breathed deeply. "Who is she Harry, and why are you letting her do it to you?"  
  
"Who is it you slept with and why are you finally awake at 11AM instead of 6AM?" Harry retorted. "I never knew Ron to keep you in bed so late. I never knew him to put that look in your eyes, actually. Not even in your first days together."  
  
"What look?" she asked angrily.  
  
"Like you're…like you were made love to for the first time." Obviously disgusted with the sentiment, he screwed up his face.  
  
"Perhaps I was." Hermione fell silent the moment the words hit the warmed air of the room.  
  
"Hermione," Harry told her, "we are completely and totally fucked up."  
  
"You already said so."  
  
"The fact you won't tell me who you're seeing only makes me right."  
  
"Evidently so." She fell silent for a while, refusing to consider the consequences of her former words. "You love her, do you?"  
  
Harry let his head drop backward. "It's not important."  
  
"But you do."  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Why don't you tell her?"  
  
"Who says I didn't?"  
  
"So you did?"  
  
"No." He shrugged his shoulders. "Drop it, Hermione. It would never work."  
  
She only stared at the wall.  
  
"Thank you," Harry said after a while.  
  
"Whatever for?"  
  
"For not saying that if I wanted it hard enough, I could make it work."  
  
She snorted. "Those who'd say so are no more than idiots," she spoke bitterly, realizing all at once how vehemently she felt about the notion. "Some relationships, some situations, cannot be worked out. Some people can't be loved into loving you back… can't be loved out of their wounds or out of their prejudices…" She could not shag Snape out of being her teacher; out of being a spy … whatever she did feel toward him could never be enough to level their position, to make the world see them as equals. Could never be enough to make it more than mind numbing, sense-shattering sex. "And yet, it still doesn't mean you should let it hurt you, Harry."  
  
"But what can I do?? Wish it all never happened?" He shook his head. "I can't! And I don't want too. Being with him… being with him…" Harry buried his face in his hands. "Do you remember what I told you about the cupboard, Hermione?"  
  
She nodded, forcing herself to ignore the sudden revelation, made in a moment of anguish, that Harry's 'she' was, in fact, a 'he'. She supposed it made things clearer, but not all that much. "I do," she said.  
  
"Well, with him," Harry continued, "there is no cupboard: I can still remember it, of course, which is important, because I know that with him I'm free of it. That I don't need to go back inside, there's no more hiding from myself."  
  
Slowly, tentatively, like Snape did for her before, Hermione put her book aside, and with the utmost carefulness, reached to touch Harry's back. She was not sure how to touch him, never being one to demonstrate her affection in a physical manner, but when Harry crawled toward her, burying his face in the hollow of her shoulder, it all became easier. Understandable.  
  
Crook, pushed aside once again, decided to abandon the bed. She followed the part-Kneazle from the periphery of her vision, while allowing Harry to settle more comfortably against her body.  
  
"When I'm with him," he said in a muffled voice, his tears soaking the fabric of her shirt, "I know I am alive. I can't give him up. Don't ask me to give him up."  
  
"I'm not asking you to give him up," she whispered, not daring to reach her hand and stroke Harry's hair. She thought it might be the right thing to do, but then she thought of herself being stroked, with the hands reaching for different, intimate places, and the gesture seemed almost obscene. She could not trust herself to stop in time.  
  
"You don't mind it… being a boy, right?"  
  
Hermione uttered a short laugh. "Why exactly should I mind? Pure blooded families' actually merged bloodlines by male marriages for ages, allowing an inferior female relative to carry the descendant, while the homo-lesbian revolution took place in the Muggle world about two decades ago. Why should I mind in the least, then?"  
  
"Is that true?" Harry rose up slowly.  
  
"Is what, true?"  
  
"That piece, about the pure blood families?"  
  
"Don't you ever listen in History of Magic?"  
  
Harry, his face still streaked with tears, watched her with a tinge of amusement. "No one ever does- except for you. It's the best lesson for catching up on sleeping hours, after Divination."  
  
"Really."  
  
She was scrutinizing him now, unsure of his intention. Harry's lovely, delicate face was too pale; touched by weariness and sadness. He was working himself too hard, they were both working themselves too hard; not for thinking it might help them catch up with some overload, but because for both of them, straining beyond exhaustion was the only way of facing their problems: the only route to oblivion. This, and whatever snowy land that was waiting for them at the other side of the cupboard - she with her Snow Queen Snape, never needing lamplight to be illuminating, and Harry and his mystery lover, basking in the merciful lantern's glow. _And isn't it dangerous_ , she wondered, _to have one's sense of aliveness dependant on other person? Snape would be freaked out to learn I'm at risk of becoming addicted to him. Or else he'd say something cruel and Snape-like, as if he wanted to mark me from within as well as from without with internal injuries, and I'd ask myself why the hell do I find him so funny while being torn into pieces_.  
  
"Harry…" she said, carefully considering her words. "If you ever wanted out, there might be a way…"  
  
"Out?" Harry was obviously amused. "And who will do my job, Dumbledore?"  
  
"Dumbledore is damn capable of… at least trying to do your job. Don't you tell me you believe in that bloody prophecy!"  
  
"I don't know, Hermione," Harry answered. "I really, honestly, don't know. All I know is that in all of the great, magnificent Wizarding World, I'm the only one willing to do this job. Probably not the one with the best training and preparation… not the most powerful, though quite powerful… but the one willing. And if _I'm_ gone, who would defeat Voldemort? If I'm gone, we're doomed… They'd say I'm a coward, 'cause I know nobody is powerful enough to beat him - then there's really no one ready to face Voldemort. I can't seek escape, and I won't seek escape. Just the way you won't, either."  
  
She sighed loudly. "You're the only one you should be thinking of, you and your boyfriend- you could go away-"  
  
"Why are you suddenly romantic?" Harry retorted with a note of annoyance in his voice. "You should be the one to go away, Hermione. If anyone has the right to, it's you. You weren't born into this world; you have no reason to fight its wars."  
  
"Perhaps…" she began, "perhaps I have no world to return to."  
  
"What bullshit! You have two loving parents waiting for you at home, swimming in money; it's true the Death Eaters might be after you because you're my friend, but you could conceal yourselves-"  
  
"-Harry," she cut across him, "you don't know everything, all right?"  
  
"You're not telling me, so how would I know?"  
  
"You're not telling me everything either, and I need my privacy just as much as you do."  
  
"Okay, okay. Hermione-" Harry's lips moved undecidedly against her collar bone, shaping unsaid words through the cloth of her tricot shirt. "Is it… is it like we don't trust each other?"  
  
She shook her head with determination. "I don't think so. You have your childhood and this impossible responsibility that should have never been placed upon your shoulders always hovering in the background, and I have my issues… giving away our secrets is like… giving away your cupboard. Imagine if you had no place to retreat to. Perhaps you can give away your secrets and your cupboard with him, but I don't expect you to do it with me. I can't do it with… well, with the person I'm seeing at the moment. Not yet, at least."  
  
"Do you think you'd ever be able to share it with him in the future?"  
  
"Maybe," she said. "Maybe not."  
  
"Does he want to know?"  
  
She gave a small, bitter laughter. "That he surely wants. The real question is why he wants to know."  
  
"Why do people usually want to know things about you…" Harry mumbled.  
  
"So they can use it against you."  
  
He snorted. "Strange. I always thought it was a way to get to know each other better. You know, like learning your lover's sore spots: not only where to tread, that how you study your enemies - but where not to touch, and what points to push until you cry, and you cry enough that you feel clean…"  
  


* * *

  
  
Because needing something meant she was losing her self-control, Hermione counted two, three, five days before attacking Snape once Wednesday's Advanced Potions was over. Tearing away his clothes, she shagged him on the classroom floor to their mutual satisfaction. This time, it was Snape who decided he preferred a warmer and softer location, and hauled her to his bed. This didn't mean, however, that her Druid training went amiss. They'd kept meeting each other, according to his strange schedule, in whatever odd hours he wanted them to meet, and never once, while he was her mentor and she, his apprentice, did he touch her. Nor did he ever approach her for anything but her training, out of his own free will. It was she who set the pace, she who decided where and when, although often enough, Snape would be the one to determine _how_.  
  
The fact he would never initiate a sexual encounter maddened her. She tried to deny him from herself, to see how long he would last before he'd approach her, but nothing ever happened. And while she seemed to experience an everlasting deprivation on those days she managed not to leap on him, Snape seemed as cool and untouched as ever. Nevertheless, when she finally came to him, he would devour her with a fervency that left her heady and giddy- and frighteningly alive, as if her mind was stretched to trap a notion that was just complex enough to stimulate her into total awakening. Her heart kept beating with that racing pulse of their lovemaking, even long hours after they had parted.  
  
Sometimes there would be conversations, buried deep inside his quilt, her face hidden in the hollows and concaves of his body - where they wouldn't have to look at each other and their voices would be dimmed either by the darkness or by the other's warm skin. She told him about Donna: about living in her mother's exhibition hall, a Barbie doll to be played with and showed off. She told him about Ernie, and betraying him, of forgetting about him when she left for Hogwarts, so drowned in her excitement at the new revelations. She told him about the summer between her fourth and fifth year; of not understanding Harry; being stressed and straining to understand him; unable to offer comfort, unable to be anything to anybody; wilting, wilting, until the razor seemed like the best option.  
  
She was sure most people would have found him a bad listener; withdrawn and introverted, sarcastic when he shouldn't say a thing, but he could have been clung to. And he did not want her to capitulate. He held her pliant and molten sugar in his arms and let her hold to him - and did not want her to capitulate.  
  
He would talk, too. Even more rarely than she did. He told her about his own mentor, Angharad; sometimes he would talk about Professor McGonagall - he had called her Minerva - so very odd. Once he spoke a little about his parents, not that much- an abusive father, a delicate mother, who wouldn't or couldn't protect him. All too stoic. She wondered whether age would have done that to him, or whether it was simply his choice not to pay it any more attention, knowing it would gain him nothing. _Are you angry_ , she thought sometimes. _Are you sore and bitter and raging underneath your crystal calmness, as I am?_  
  
He would still be poignant and annoying, still taunt her and make cruel remarks- and she would answer with equal malice. She remembered gasping, once, as she impaled herself on his cock, a stuttered admission - in the grip of pleasure - saying that she had never felt that way before.  
  
"That, Hermione, is because you were sleeping with a boy," he told her, smug and cynical as ever.  
  
"Oh, is it?" she retorted, her eyes glowing. "Ron was twice the man you are, since you really _beg_ to know. He was bigger and stronger, and when he held me in his arms, I felt like a fragile porcelain doll. But you… you…" Hermione moaned. "You fuck me to my very soul… I can feel you in my marrow and my blood sings. Damn, I'm getting poetic. Can you get it? Can you possibly get it?"  
  
From time to time, he would look at her hands- subtly, or more obviously. Usually his eyes drifted sidewise to look at them, as if he didn't want to stress her. There would be no more talking about her visiting St Mungo's, though she knew the threat was always there, on the edge of his lips, the moment he felt her condition worsened. Always, when they celebrated a ritual at the Stones, he would wash her hands for her. At first she had to initiate the act, then he followed her example, and it became part of their private ritual. He kept demanding to know why, and she kept being unable to explain it to him. The drool, she thought; the touch- wrong touch that lingers, the things that made you dirty and stuck like dried bubblegum to the inner cervix of your soul - how could one ever explain that?  
  
Sometimes she would forget he was her teacher and she was his student. Then next Monday would crash in, and reality would roar in her ears, cruel and vicious and disinterested in what either of them might have wished for. _Did he actually wish for something to be different?_ She didn't know. She couldn't tell. In the classroom, he kept treating her with the same deliberate coldness.  
  
"It hurts, did you know that?" she told him after the class was over. Staying behind was risky, and she was doing it too many times, but he had been cruel, and although she knew he had to keep up the façade, there was part of her protesting at the indecency of this- that she should offer him her body and mind, and he would treat her so, if only because his position allowed him to; if only because his reputation demanded he must.  
  
Snape glowered at her, pointing his wand at the door and warding it, then adding a silencing charm. "Are you aware of the fact that by staying behind, you are risking us both?"  
  
"Forget that!" she called. "You are being cruel and you know it!"  
  
"Would you rather have me treat you as my lover? Perhaps you just wish me to go and present the Headmaster with my resignation letter and ask for you to be transferred," he raged. "Is that what you want, Hermione?"  
  
"Do you think I'm an idiot?" she replied with similar fury. "All I want from you is to tone down your comments. Saying you don't see a need for my opinions in your classroom, ever, was uncalled for."  
  
"Touchy."  
  
"You fuck."  
  
"Three points from Gryffindor."  
  
"Zillion points from Slytherin," she answered, enraged. "Ever thought about what you'll do when I'm no longer your student?" she asked him while moving to sit on his desk. A formidable piece of furniture - it must have had been smeared with semen and bartholin, where the devil's hand worked it into the wood. She liked to think it have been wafting the fragrance of their own mixed essences, after having fucked so many times on its stable surface.  
  
Quickly rolling up her skirt and disposing of her knickers, she gave Snape a cocky look. "What are you waiting for?"  
  
She watched him freeing himself of his trousers and briefs, never bothering to withhold her cry of pleasure as he plunged into her, ramming her against the table.  
  
His eyelashes fluttered for a moment, his face unmasking with the strangest and yet most alluring expression, then he lowered his gaze to watch her. Hermione moistened her lips, entranced, but unsure why he should look stricken.  
  
"I have no idea," Snape said after a while, setting a quick, sharp rhythm. "I guess I'll just have to cope."


	16. A Plan of Action

he does not have to feel because he thinks  
(the thoughts of others,be it understood)  
he does not have to think because he knows  
(that anything is bad which you think good)

\--from " he does not have to feel because he thinks"

\-- e.e.cummings

Snape sat quietly in the darkness of his office, a small glass of whiskey in his hand. He'd been considering one little query of Hermione's for quite some time. Multiple days, in fact. "Ever imagined what you'll do when I'm not your student?" She meant to mock him, asking him what he would do when he could no longer deduct points from Gryffindor for her imagined infractions, but Snape had found a deeper meaning there, one she had not intended. He'd mumbled "Nox," earlier, leaving no light in the room. It was better to think his dark thoughts in darkness, he'd decided.

Merlin, yes, he'd wondered what he would do when she was no longer his student. He was torn into shreds by the thoughts her simple question had engendered. It was enough to make him want to cast Engorgio on the Jameson's, climb inside the bottle, and drown there.

He wondered what he would do when she decided she'd learned enough of the Druid way of life; he didn't fool himself that she shared his beliefs in the goddess and the god; she had made that clear at Samhain.

He wondered what he would do when she decided that sex with the Potions Master of Hogwarts was passֳ©, or more likely, not worth risking her education for.

But most of all, he wondered what he would do when she was no longer around for him to torment, teach, or touch. In a few more months, assuming he was correct about Voldemort's tentative schedule for disposing of his enemies in one fell swoop, there would be a war. At the very least, there would be Hermione's graduation, and the young woman would find the wide world so much more appealing than the narrow, sheltered life she'd led so far. He was unlikely to be a part of that life, in however small a way.

He wondered a great many other things, as well. It was a testament to his rigid control, some days, that he didn't just fly apart into a thousand bits of Snape and flail uselessly on the floor, straining for some semblance of order. He wondered why he was still bothering to snoop after Voldemort for Dumbledore, when the Headmaster never seemed surprised by the information Snape brought him. Always three steps ahead of everyone else, Dumbledore.

Snape had actual nightmares from which he woke, sweating. In the dreams, Dumbledore, with terrible sweetness, pulled away that long, silver beard to reveal the strange and eerie features of Riddle beneath. The last one had wakened him, grunting, with Hermione beside him in his bed, sprawled in her warm and boneless sleep, her head pillowed on his shoulder, her wild hair across his mouth. It wasn't often that he fell asleep next to her -- something about actual sleep with her was too intimate to be borne, regardless of the seeming paradox of sleep versus sleeping with -- but that night he'd been so sated and worn that when she mumbled "Don't go," and tucked her arm across him firmly, he'd stayed put for a change. She had been wakened by his noisy thrashing, and by the time he fully surfaced from the dream, Hermione was half-sitting, watching him curiously with knowing eyes, her wand lit. She had her own demons; she recognized them in others. And when she asked what was wrong and he told her warily, "Nothing," she had nodded, leaned over him to kiss his mouth until his hand came up, helpless to resist threading through her hair, and then said to him, "Liar." But she hadn't pressed, and he hadn't taken points from Gryffindor.

He also wondered why there had not been a summons from Voldemort in more than six weeks. It was atypical for the evil wizard to leave his followers in peace for so long. Snape frowned at the dim glow of his glass, reflecting a glimmer of light from a book that rested on the desk, a book with phosphorescent lettering on its spine. The spy in him suspected that there had been a summons, and he'd not been called. He pondered what that could mean, and decided that he must talk with Lucius, and soon. The rest of the whiskey in his glass went down warmly, glowing in his belly. He considered pouring another.

A moment later he stiffened, hearing the soft, sliding click of the wards on the classroom door. Hermione. No one else came to his dungeon this time of night. He set the glass aside quietly and rose. His eagerness took him aback momentarily. He hadn't seen her for a few days, except in his class, and he felt a strong need of her. First he would kiss her senseless. Then he would take her over his desk, from behind, whispering in her ear, listening to her harsh breathing, waiting for her to come hard, the way she always seemed to when he took her on his desk. Something about it aroused her tremendously. And then he would take her back to his rooms, and feed her. She was always hungry after sex, it seemed.

"Are you sure it's empty?" Not Hermione's voice.

A crystal chuckle. "Of course it is. The git's bound to be in bed by now, even with thirty feet of punishment essays to grade from last week." Malfoy. And Potter. "Besides, you've got your cloak with you, don't you? We won't be seen."

There was a sound, soft, as of clothing being shed. Then a few small thuds, shoes hitting the floor. Potter's voice, again. "It's cold, Draco. Why'd you think this would be a good place?"

"Because I know how to open Snape's wards, and no one will think of looking for us here. Come here, let me warm you."

"It's so dark in here."

"That's how we know he's not in his office, you nitwit. Now stop complaining."

"I want to see you," said Potter now. "Light your wand, Draco."

A sigh. There was a long silence that stretched into a minute or more; cold, alienated silence. Then a pause, and a break. "Look, I'm sorry, baby, I know it's dark, but I can't light my wand -- the light might be seen under the door. We'd get caught. Don't you think I want light, too?"

"I don't care if we get caught." Bitter defiance. Indignation. Perhaps, the thought struck Snape a second before it disappeared, the son is like his mother in more than one way.

"Well, I do. You know why it cannot be -- not yet --"

"When?"

There was silence, or nearly so, and soft broken breathing. Snape supposed they were kissing. Lily would only let go of the subject when he kissed her. He walked silently to the doorway of his office and stood there listening.

"Oh, Harry -- wait, slowly, love -- I -- wait, while I --"

"...while I waited for you to make up your mind, Severus." Lily tossed her hair, sitting across from him at the Leaky Cauldron. "And finally I couldn't wait any longer."

Severus shrugged, taking a long pull at his onion ale. Lily had refused ale, asking instead for a butterbeer. Severus sneered at such a sweet childish drink, but she ignored him. "And that meant you had to choose James Potter? Of all the people you could have chosen, why him? The one you knew I hated most?"

"Merlin, it was always about you, wasn't it? You, you, you. The most selfish man I ever knew, Severus. You were a selfish boy, and nothing changed as you grew." She pushed back from the table and crossed her arms beneath her breasts. Her movements lifted those soft curving mounds, pressed them together beneath her robes, and he knew a moment of hot longing to touch them. She wore Potter's wedding band, but that mattered not at all to him. Lily Evans should belong to him, even now.

Lily kicked him under the table. She knew he was looking at her breasts. "Bastard," she muttered. "I don't know why I agreed to meet you here."

"I do," he said. "You're curious."

She snorted. "Curious. About, what, Severus? About a man who expected me to bow down, and worship at the great font of Snape? What's there to be curious about? A selfish child, unable to love. Not such a mystery, let me tell you."

He stiffened. "I loved you."

"Once, maybe, in your limited way. But you loved yourself more. You loved your intellect, your potions, your...your Death Eater friends. You loved to be feared." She turned her glass around and around on the table, and he could see there was more she wanted to say.

"Out with it," he muttered. "There's more, I can tell. Why don't you just get it over with, Lily, go ahead and gut me. You already cut out my heart and fed it to me when you married Potter. Finish the job, don't be such a fucking coward."

Her eyes flared at him in fury. She stopped turning the glass stein and stared at him. "I was never a coward, Severus, and you know it. I tried to reach you, with every scrap of my being, and you...just...never met me half way. Or even a third of the way. I'd have reached further if I thought just once...just once..." Her anger overwhelmed her, as it so often had, boiling uselessly into hot tears.

"That much vaunted Gryffindor courage," he muttered. "Gryffindor and Slytherin, never to mix. You listened to Black and Potter and Lupin, Lily. You turned your back on me."

"I had to," she said, "because you never gave me what I needed."

He pushed back from the table, the legs of his chair grating deafeningly against the floor tiles. Heads turned around them. He met those looks with a black glare, and eyes flickered away quickly. "Bullshit, Lily. I gave you what was mine to give."

She dropped her voice. "All I ever got from you was your cock and your self-righteousness, and an empty circle of friends. Nothing else, ever. I wanted your love. I wanted you to adore me. I needed you to fucking need me, Severus. More than your intellect. More than your precious isolation. That's what James offered me, Severus. A pedestal, of sorts --"

He strode away from the table and out the door. Outside, in the chill of the air, he ran both his hands through his hair, suddenly panting. When he was seventeen, he had adored her, hadn't he? He'd shown her how much he needed her. Just...not publicly, that's all. What had she wanted? Snogging in the Great Hall? A boyfriend to dangle in front of her catty girlfriends? An adoring slave? At seventeen, he could give her none of that. He hadn't lied; he'd given her what was in him to give. But she'd apparently needed more than he was capable of.

Merlin. Gutted.

His ale wanted to churn its way back up his throat. He hadn't felt this ill since her wedding day, when he'd Apparated himself out of his London flat to Lucius' place in Hampshire, needing something besides his own company for once. He'd been afraid of what he wanted most: to arrive at the handfasting of Lily Evans and James Potter in his towering black rage, to use the ability that he knew was in him. His powerful killing curse, his Avada Kedavra, untried but strong, he knew it. Against Potter, to see him dead, and take Lily away from Potter forever. That wanting had been so strong in him that he knew he couldn't remain alone. Lucius, as always, was welcoming and friendly, and had generously shown him to the drawing room of Malfoy Estate, where the two of them had gotten raucously drunk over a game or six of wizard chess. The handfasting went on as scheduled, and a week later Severus had returned to his London flat and his job as though nothing had happened. Lily was erased from his heart.

Behind him the door of the Leaky Cauldron banged open and she was suddenly in front of him, her hair a violent wildfire of glory, tossing in her anger. He pushed past her and went around the corner. Done with this nonsense. It had been a mistake, in Gringott's, to touch her arm as she stood in line two wizards ahead of him, and ask her to go for a drink. It had been a mistake to let himself realize she had never been erased from his heart, just hidden.

But Merlin, she was following. Lily, don't.

"Severus Snape," she spat. "Don't walk away from me. I'm not through with you yet."

He spun. They were in a dim alley, empty of anything except a cart with boxes of wizarding fireworks on it. He took hold of her shoulders and backed her to the wall, and his mouth crushed hers. And oh, gods, it was as though Potter had never existed; she never even fought, she just melted against him as always, melted, and his rage was vanquished by her mouth. She opened her lips to him. When his hand went to her breast, she made a soft noise, almost a whimper, almost a coo, and he knew they must find a room soon or he would take her here, now, against the wall, wedding band on her finger or not. Potter's property or not. His hand was filled with her breast; to his delight, there seemed to be much more there than he remembered ever cupping before. His mouth softened against hers and he slid his hand down from her breast, over her ribcage, over her abdomen, and stopped when he felt that small stirring under his palm.

He staggered back from her, almost falling. She stared at him, eyes wide, darkened, lips swollen. Her abdomen was swollen, too. How had he not noticed? Her robes hardly concealed the lump of her pregnant belly.

Now he did vomit, turning his back. Potter's get, growing inside Lily. His desire was instantly stifled. You didn't notice because you didn't want to, Snape, he told himself. You didn't see because you wanted to put something like that in her yourself. Out of the corner of his eye he could see her protective hands lacing over that lump. "Severus, I --"

"Say nothing," he rasped. "I don't want to hear it, I won't --"

But she was inexorable, and her words did more than just gut him. They struck his very soul a death blow.

"I know what you're thinking. Potter, of all people. And do you know why, Severus? Because you hated him the most. Because it would hurt you the most. Because you hurt me, and because now, finally, I can hurt you back."

"I can't see what you're doing, Draco. C'mon, light your wand; mine's in my robe pocket. I want so much to watch you --" Harry was almost moaning the words.

Snape, returning to the present time, moved away from the doorframe where he'd been leaning and went back inside his office, closing his door with a slam. That would clear the classroom, no question. Still no points from Gryffindor; Lily's boy had enough trouble, sleeping with Malfoy and destined for Voldemort. Potter's boy or not.

He sat at his desk again, still debating about whether or not to pour a second shot of the whiskey. His fingers flattened against the wood of the desk, moving across it, as if to feel for traces of Hermione and himself, having sex there. The desk was much less cluttered these days than he normally kept it. Less clutter meant less to clear away, those afternoons or evenings when Hermione remained after class or returned long after dinner, her duties as Hogwarts Head Girl complete for the night, sliding into his lap or simply removing her knickers and urging him to pound relentlessly into her body. At one time he had wished for a smaller desk; this one took up so much of his office. But now, that wide desk was transformed, another bed for him and his young lover, a bed he very much enjoyed. And, given her reactions, one she enjoyed as well.

He thought back to their last encounter, several days before, a quiet weekend spent primarily in his quarters, though he'd found time to take her to the Forbidden Forest and show her more of the plants useful or sacred to the Druids. They had pushed into the Forest until the black roses, somehow still blooming even this late in November, sent their soporific fragrance wrapping around them both.

Somewhere, off the pathway there in the forest, Hermione had halted and hooked her fingers through the back of his belt as he walked ahead of her through the brush, looking for aconite. Snape knew her signals by now, and his pulse had leapt when he turned, to find her smiling, sultry, eager. He never allowed himself to initiate sex with Hermione -- it must always be her choice to receive his attentions, he would never corner her again. Not to mention the stupid part of his brain that told him it was all right to have sex with a student, as long as the student was willing -- but neither did he ever refuse her. It was simply too delightful.

"Let me," she whispered, her palms moving to the fly of his trousers, where he was already hardening, simply from seeing the expression on her face and knowing what she had in mind for him. "Hmm. Professor." His eyes closed as she unbuckled his belt and opened the fly. Hermione knelt in front of him and took him into her mouth. He never lasted long when she did this; the sensations were too intense. And oh, she was good at it, good at reading the signs from his body, good at maintaining a ferocious suction with the briefest of pauses, that drove him over the edge. Snape wished for a tree trunk to lean back against, or better yet, a bed beneath him. He let his fingers slide into her hair, but he'd learned the hard way not to take control of these moments; she would bite if he became too aggressive or rough. Still, he could not help some movement of his hips; he longed to fuck her mouth, but held back. She was taking him swiftly to the brink this time, instead of lingering over the task.

"Hermione," he groaned, exploding. He almost staggered, almost fell. She looked up at him and he saw her throat move as she swallowed. Merlin.

"Are we almost done here in the Forest, for today?" she asked, tucking him back into his trousers, giving him a final pat -- good professor -- after she buckled his belt.

"I'm certainly done," he muttered. "I'll never be able to find aconite now, you've destroyed my concentration, Apprentice."

She looked smug, rising. "Good. Because I'm hungry."

Despite himself, he almost smiled. "You just ate," he muttered, pulling her close with his hand at the nape of her neck, feeding himself on her mouth in a brief, hard kiss.

She dismissed that idea with a flick of her hand. "A little protein, some saline, a few simple sugars. Not my idea of balanced nutrition, Snape."

He did chuckle at that, and surprised a bemused look on her face, as though she had just heard or seen something incomprehensible. Potions Master Snape, laughing? It hadn't happened, surely.

"Something's funny?" she demanded.

"Always the scientist."

"Chemically speaking, that's --"

"Yes, yes. I know the chemical breakdown. I simply find it amusing that you do, as well." He took her face between his hands and looked at her squarely. "You don't have to swallow, you know."

"I want to," she told him. "You are my lover."

That struck a little too deeply, and he released her, hooding his eyes, turning back for the castle. Her lover. Hmm.

~*~

A few evenings later, as November was drawing to a close, Snape went to visit Minerva in her own office. He found he needed to speak with her about two of those Gryffindor hearts in her care. Two he didn't understand; one in particular he sought to comprehend: Hermione's. The other, Potter's heart, he felt Minerva should be warned about, though he could never have explained why. Once again, he chalked it up to the fact that Potter was Lily's boy. There couldn't be much of an explanation, otherwise. It's not like he was fond of the brat, or felt responsible for him in some way.

At the past couple of moon celebrations at the Circle, Snape had taught Hermione how to call down the Needfire. She had been successful, and he was pleased to see her elation. She might yet come to regard the goddess and god as something more than mere figureheads, more than anchor points to which a religion of sorts was attached. He had praised her skill, gratified to see a look of pleased surprise on her face at his words.

However. She still came to him after each ritual, once the altar was rinsed, and held out her arms for him to bathe them. And while the redness was indeed reduced, it was not yet gone. Something was still not right in her, not clean to her mind. What it could be he could not even imagine, but despite her earlier protestations that the outbreaks would only last a week or two, this one had been going on far too long and it was time he addressed it. It was his duty as her teacher, no matter how far across the student-teacher dividing line he had dragged her into his personal world. It was a world where Druidism, redemption, regret, and the thinnest measure of hope dominated his every aspect and colored all his perspectives. The bi-weekly washing was only holding the black wings in her soul at bay; it wasn't healing her. Something had to be done.

"Severus!" Minerva exclaimed now, as he wandered in. Unlike him, Minerva never warded her office while she was in it. She, Gryffindor that she was, remained accessible to her students whenever possible. She looked pleased to see him. "What brings you here?"

"Your students," he said, lounging in a chair across from her as she sat behind her desk. He folded his hands across his belly. Minerva's office was soothing, filled with books and artifacts. He could have done without all the red and gold, but the place was always warm. Snape supposed he felt welcomed. Sometimes it made him uncomfortable if he thought about it too long. Minerva apparently had affection to spare; he had never quite fathomed her fondness for him.

She put down her quill and pulled off her pointed hat, sailing it towards a hat rack in the corner. Snape could see it was not going to land properly, and waved his hand to help it settle on a hook. "Thank you, Severus. Now -- about Peach and Skullcap."

Snape shook his head. "Not those two, I fixed their wagons early in the year. They've not been problems since then."

Her brows rose. "Really? How did you solve their interpersonal conflicts?" At her question, he got an evil look on his face, and Minerva drew her mouth into a tight line. "Severus. What have you done?"

"I soaked their wands in Reciprocal Potion, so that they'd have to hear each other's thoughts for a period of time. I thought it might help them gain...perspective."

Her shoulders relaxed. "Heavens, is that all. I thought perhaps you'd hexed them."

Snape made an indignant noise. "I do not hex my students." I just have sex with them. That's not so bad, is it?

"Well then, if it's not Simon you want to speak to me about, who is it?"

"Potter and Granger."

That made her sit back in her chair and stare at him. "What about them?" she asked, slowly. "Do we need to take this to Albus' office?"

"We do not," he said firmly. "I simply need to make you aware of a few things regarding the two."

Minerva leaped to another conclusion. "Surely Hermione isn't sleeping with Harry too, now," she muttered. "I would never have thought -- after Ron --"

Snape tried to stop a blush. "She's not sleeping with Potter," he muttered, then realized how that might sound -- too much knowledge of a Gryffindor, on his part, could look suspicious. He had not come here to confess his own sins. "At least, not as far as I know. Potter's sleeping with Malfoy, which is one reason I'm here."

Minerva exhaled. "I was afraid of that," she murmured. "He's been so distant lately, and there hasn't been that same old tension between the two of them. It's been different. When did you find out?"

"I knew for certain several days ago. Malfoy got past the wards on the Potions classroom long after hours last week. He had Potter with him. Let me just say their intentions seemed clear; I let them know they'd been overheard, and they scampered away. I was in my office at the time."

"Yet...Severus, you deducted no points from Gryffindor?"

He considered his answer. He couldn't very well tell her he was feeling merciful towards Lily's boy because he was the lamb for Voldemort's slaughter, nor that he felt sleeping with a Malfoy would be trouble enough for Potter, nor that he himself was guilty of an infraction that would make casual shagging between students seem pale in comparison. He cast about for a moment. "I...felt bad about..."

Minerva interrupted with a small smile. "Oh, yes, the twenty points you took from Gryffindor when you caught Hermione and Ron in the hallway. Well, I must say this is a bit more fair."

Snape was silent. Best to let her think as she was doing.

"What should we do about Harry and Draco, then, do you think?"

"I had planned to do nothing except make you aware," he replied. "He's your responsibility, do as you see fit. I myself see no reason to obstruct them, but they bear watching to ensure they don't hurt one another inordinately; in addition, there's...that issue, of Voldemort, and Malfoy's father, still a Death Eater. Tales could be carried, taken from pillow talk, however innocently told. That bit is in my purview to attend, as you know. But now, to Miss Granger."

"What about her?" Minerva stiffened, placing her hands flat on the surface of her desk, looking straight at him. "What's happened to her?"

"Have you taken a good look at her lately? Noticed anything different?"

Minerva paled. "Please don't tell me you think she might be pregnant, Severus. You know the reputation of the Weasley men -- beyond fertile --"

Snape blanched. Gods, of course she wasn't pregnant; he brewed the contraceptive potions himself and watched her drink them; not to mention, he drank the male variant as well. Much better doubly safe than a parent so young, and Merlin knew he was not of the constitution to raise a child. And, gods, Weasley. He fought back a stammer. "No, no, not that."

"Then what, Severus?"

"Have you looked at her hands, her arms? How red, how raw they are?"

Minerva tilted her head. "Now that you mention it, yes. But -- Severus -- I had assumed she was working on something...caustic...in your Advanced Potions classes! I assumed you were taking care of it."

Snape realized the bitter irony of her words, though he knew she did not. "I'm trying to take care of it," he said. "That's why I'm here. It's not caustic potions that are injuring her that way: she's doing it to herself, Minerva. She's...washing, scrubbing, scraping herself, until she's raw, sometimes bloody. And --" he halted, giving himself a moment in which to regroup, a bit shocked by the harshness of his emotions, apparent in his voice. "And I haven't been able to stop it. Not completely."

"What do you think is causing it?" she asked.

He hesitated. "I have pondered this a long time. There appears to be some hidden trauma. It's not been a problem before this year, Minerva, but now -- now, there are many pressures upon her, and I believe that trauma is manifesting itself in this destructive manner. She is Hogwarts Head Girl. She has been having sex for the first time, with Weasley, though that...appears to have ended, which brings to bear a different sort of pressure. She is more than aware of Potter's...grooming...for some job with Voldemort in the battle that is surely coming. I'm sure she believes that all three of them, Granger, Potter, and Weasley, will be part of whatever scenario unfolds. In addition, N.E.W.T.s are coming up, and you surely know how tense she will be over those." Oh, and did I happen to mention? She's taking instruction in druidism, and taking her Potions Master's cock as well. Not that such things would add to her stress level, no indeed.

Minerva smiled. "I certainly do know. I expect very high scores out of that young lady, actually. Hmm, Severus. What shall we do about this? I must think a moment." She closed her eyes, removed her glasses, and pinched the bridge of her nose.

Snape fidgeted. It seemed he had made it past the danger point without giving himself and Hermione away. Minerva was typically very astute where her students were concerned, and had often surprised him with her intuitions about himself.

She spoke at last. "I think we must involve her parents. Perhaps this has been a problem in the past; they may have advice to offer."

"Muggles," Snape muttered. "Dentists?"

"Loving parents," Minerva reminded him. She nodded firmly to herself. "I will owl them, immediately. Now, tonight. Help me draft a letter. As her Head of House, I can do nothing less. If it weren't such a bad time for us to be absent from the school, I would even say we should take Hermione home and all discuss what's been happening to her. She needs the warmth and comfort of her family to help her through this."

Snape rose and went around to the back of her desk to help her write to the Grangers, those dentists.


	17. Hinc illae lacrimae

"Between violence and silently seething  
Between my fist and my Pollyanna flower  
Between "Fuck you!" to your face and "It's all right."  
Between war and denial."  
  
\--Pollyanna Flower. Alanis Morisette.  
  
  
The letter arrived at breakfast. It had been carried by an ordinary looking school owl that had carelessly dropped it over Hermione's breakfast of bran flakes; wholemeal toast (thinly spread with butter and marmite); fruits-salad and yogurt. The owl stopped to nibble some cornflakes off of a nearby dish, then spread its wings and flew away.  
  
Her eyes narrowing suspiciously, Hermione picked the edge of the longish, Muggle-looking envelope between her thumb and index finger, shaking off the tiny bits of bran flakes still sticking to the crispy paper. Her face - usually clear as an open palm at mornings - distorted with distaste when she noted the Granger's clinic's logo tattooed on the soft flesh of the envelope. _Like a scar_.  
  
"Is everything all right, pet?" Harry, at her side, was leaning over his repulsive breakfast of grease-soaked food, scanning the envelope with a worried expression.  
  
She wanted to fist some cornflakes from the public dish and hurl them in his face. "I told you to stop using endearments with me, now didn't I?"  
  
"Sorry, Hermione-"  
  
"What're you two whisperin' 'bout?" Ron asked with his mouth full of egg and bacon.  
  
"Ronald Weasley!" she cried angrily, clawing at this little piece of distraction like rabbit clawing the ground, the wire quickly fastening around and into the flesh of her leg, "how many times have I told you _not_ to speak with your mouth full?"  
  
"Hermione received a letter from her posh parents," Harry teased, probably thinking that humouring her might lift her spirits a little. "Don't they always send you stuff? Come on, Hermione, open it, what can they possibly want?"  
  
_Only my soul_ , she retorted silently. "They sometimes send me things I request, true, but they never use-" She pursed her lips, ignoring the wire's bite. _They never send mail from the clinic, damnit_ ; never with the clinic's logo, never when they should be tampering with some patient's orifice; too busy to usually remember they actually have a daughter.  
  
"Come on, Mione," Ron joined the celebrations. "If it's _that_ kind of letter, you should really open it."  
  
"Patience is a virtue," she burst, igniting at the slightest provocation. _Oh, God…!_ Why couldn't he just shut up?? "Now stop making pests of yourselves and finish your breakfasts."  
  
Subduing herself into calmness, she cleaned her knife with a napkin. Then, using a short, punctual move, she opened the envelope with one clear stroke. Inside laid a single sheet of the same crispy, expensive paper. Hermione had immediately recognized Donna's script.  
  
She scanned the lovely, carefully fashioned letters, wondering sarcastically if Snape would show at her funeral, as she read the perfectly composed paragraphs. Her keen sense for dissociation allowed her to observe things from a distance, and reading briefly through her mother's words, she had simultaneously watched the mimicry of her own cheerful expression slowly crack; thin lines of blood interlacing the fine, marble knobs of her eyeballs, horror staining and dimming the soft, bivalve hue of her complexion.  
  
_… Breathe in when you go down, allow the air to inflate your abdomen; she reminded herself. Breath out when you go up- let the air form a column of calmness and peace from your Root Chakra up to your Crown Chakra, ascending from the base of your spine to finally circle your head and induce a sense of serenity…_  
  
_Alas_ , she thought with tears in her eyes, momentarily blind to her surroundings. _Tu quoque, Severe, amans mei? Hinc illae lacrimae_.  
  
_I trust that you do know, however, that the traitor's head belongs on a spear, displayed over the castle's walls for all to see_.  
  


* * *

  
  
Hermione stepped calmly into the Potions classroom, bolting the door behind her and warding it carefully. Then, at last, she cast a strong silencing charm. Snape, at his aphrodisiac-waxed desk, raised his eyes from the current heap of essays he had been grading, and gave her an enigmatic gaze. She stifled the urge to go straight for the throat - reminding herself one should bring their opponent as close as possible before sticking the dagger - and eased her way over to sit on his desk.  
  
"Bastard."  
  
Snape sighed.  
  
_Well well well_ , at least he knew what she was talking about.  
  
"We had an agreement," he said at last.  
  
"An agreement that you'd approach Professor McGonagall, so she would grant me her permission to leave Hogwarts during the school year, in order to visit St. Mungo's," she reminded him coolly. Frost was ascending from her belly, shooting straight from her womb, wrapping around her vocal cords on its way up to blow in smoky words into his fey, harsh face. "An agreement, may I remind you, which had nothing to do with approaching my parents."  
  
"Professor McGonagall and I felt it would be best for you."  
  
She pursued her lips. _Wonder how long I can keep this faחade before snapping, or turning into ice myself_.  
  
_Darling Professor_ , she thought, hardly restraining a sudden wave of hurt and betrayal: _if you could only look inside my head, you would be surprised to see the murderous jumble you put there. Nevertheless, I'm straying. Bring near first, stab second. Then you can hurt yourself all you like. But first, get the job done_.  
  
"You thought it would be best for me, now did you?" Hermione's legs were hanging from the table, swinging lightly. "Didn't it even once occur to you that I might differ with you?"  
  
The Potions Master, apparently tired with her, pinched the bridge of his nose. "As I told you once, you may have to trust my judgment."  
  
She nodded. "You also told me that at any time I could stand up and walk away. You didn't give me that choice, though."  
  
"I had your welfare in mind, Hermione." A hint of impatience crept into his voice.  
  
"If you had my welfare in mind, you would not be sending me home for Christmas," she said gently. "If you had your own welfare in mind, you would not have approached my parents." _If you had had my welfare in mind, you would not have betrayed my trust, so I wouldn't have to hurt you the most; so I wouldn't have to hurt me afterwards, because I have no doubt it would be too much to contain_. God, didn't he keep his reserve scalpels someplace near, in one of the upper drawers? It had been years, and yet she had failed to find a better solution. Failed to grow out of the childish self-destructiveness of a lonely, helpless, thirteen-year old girl.  
  
Snape leaned back in his armchair, his eyes gleaming. The gleam was part amusement, part a threat. Once it would have made her afraid, but not anymore. She knew she could stand up to him.  
  
"What is this game you're playing?"  
  
"I'm not playing. You warned me not to play games with you," she said. "And I, unlike yourself, bear such requests in mind."  
  
"Fine." He nodded. "A threat, then."  
  
Hermione shook her head. "I don't make idle threats."  
  
"Really?" A trace of a smile floated in his grey, dark eyes. "Foolish girl. Go back to the sandbox where you belong."  
  
_His face_ , she thought. _It might be a Jack-O'-Lantern sculpted to show a horrifying vision of mockery, lit from inside by those rare smiles of his; but whether he would light a shadow-ridden field where a headless dragoon decapitates innocent villagers, or a small porch where a she-cat and her cubs are entangled in a knot of cattish limbs - well, that was another question altogether_.  
  
Hermione breathed, rubbing her eyes tiredly. "Yes," she replied. "Soon enough I'll return to the sandbox. That is where you sent me and that is where I shall go. However, seeing that you betrayed my trust, I'll make sure you suffer the consequences."  
  
He arched an eyebrow. "Explain yourself."  
  
"Ah, Professor Snape. Darling Professor Snape. Notorious Head of Slytherin House, Suddenly interested in the mentally ill Gryffindor Head Girl. Dear child," she mocked with feigned empathy. "Just look at her hands! Those sore, red hands!" Hermione looked at her lover, having no doubt he knew full well where she was heading. "Poor Miss Granger, she must be really disturbed to hurt herself this way, the little darling, such a bright girl she is… And this vile Potions Master, an ex Death Eater, you surely know, taking advantage of someone of her-"  
  
A muscle in his jaw clenched, his pupils so wide and dilated that for a moment, she could discern no grey in them. Not even once had she seen him so angry, and a frozen, beautiful satisfaction poured into her circulation like an injection of new fallen snow.  
  
"Enough! Enough!" Snape roared. "You ungrateful, little bitch-"  
  
She blinked, blinked again, and without much ado, slapped him across the face. "You watch your mouth when speaking to me." Having her fingers scorch his cool, pale skin with her heated anger was somehow elating.  
  
Snape uttered a noise of total surprise. She expected him to reach for his wand, and welcomed the bliss of whatever curse he might chose to launch at her. However, nothing happened.  
  
Hermione swallowed, forcing spittle down her suddenly arid throat. Midnight's vultures were gliding above, lazily waiting for what might be left of her soul when he finally finished with her. The sirocco was curling in her hair, scorching her lips, hurling dust in her dry, narrowed eyes; the sands were endless, dune after dune of rich, golden sands. All of Midas's gold lay bare in front of her, hers to kneel before and bury her hands in. The glowing eyeball of the sun made her own skin a molten gold, but it was the mirage of his eyes; the dark, bubbling ponds of her lover's eyes that led her forward, stumbling across another dune toward an oasis… But there was no oasis: only the repulsing lips and fingers that she hated - to lick the sun induced gilt off her skin - and Donna, turning her back to them. There was no well, no pond… the mirage was swiftly ascending off the sands, out of her reach, out of her sight… and Snape, sprawled in his chair, was still scrutinizing her with the same cool, impersonal look that made first years shiver. She wanted to shiver, too. Wanted to put her hand in her mouth and chew on her fingers. _She didn't_. Not yet. Not while he was watching.  
  
"Well," he said at last. A scowl flashed on his face, but just as quickly it faded. His reactions followed each other quickly, changing from one to the next almost faster than she could register them. What was he thinking, behind that flickering mask? What would he do to her for her effrontery?  
  
She felt too small to move - the terror in her lower abdomen piercing her, affixing her to the desk's surface - and yet, offered him a daring look. _That's right, Snape. Pain me until I'm numb, and then, perhaps, I am at peace_.  
  
He kept watching her. No longer scrutinizing; only, it seemed, a tad sad. "I'm removing myself from your chessboard," he said at last. "Go and implement your little scheme, you're free to go. I won't contradict you. However, I won't be your substitute for a razor. If you wish to hurt yourself, go do it somewhere else. You won't have me as a willing participant, Hermione."  
  
She stared at him. "It's not like that."  
  
He sighed. "I don't believe you. Now, the door is that way. Please see yourself out." His voice was chill. Turning back to the papers on his desk, he reached for his quill, stopped by her small cry.  
  
Swallowing, she forced back the tears. "I told you, _it's not like that!_ "  
  
Snape tilted his head, suddenly leaning forward, lacing his fingers. "Isn't it? Then tell me, Hermione, _how is it, exactly?_ "  
  
A sob escaped her tightened lips, and she averted her eyes, unable to look at him. He was too close, all of a sudden. _Calm down_ , she rebuked herself, _you worthless, quivering baby. Calm down this instant and take it like an adult_. Taking a calming breath, Hermione made herself face Snape once again. "Even if it was like that, it is none of your God damn business," she said through gritted teeth.  
  
" _The hell it isn't_ ," Snape retorted. "It became my bloody business the moment you made me a part of it."  
  
"I never forced myself on you."  
  
There was a long moment of silence, Snape's grey eyes holding hers, assessing, mathematically perfect in their calculation of her reactions. When he spoke, it was very quietly, almost with regret, but clearly, like acid dripping, each word striking her skin; burning there. "You never let me help you either."  
  
She closed her eyes, feeling how the tears gnawed their way like tiny, blind moles through the dusty tunnels of her memory: they chewed their way through her firmly rooted fears, down, to the terror in her lower abdomen and the frost in her womb, they ate the lint of repulsion and disgust, scattered like moss all over her internal organs, and finally split her skin like the larva's worm, finished, at last, eating its way through its host's body. _Go on_ , she thought, _do your job and chew away this thin, waxy coating of dirt glazing my skin_ , but the moles only stared, stopping in place, apparently repulsed, too, by the ear-wax-like substance. And then, one by one, they dropped from her arms, belly, legs and chest, and there were no tears: just junk memories and a clot of ear-wax stuck in her throat, unable to break free. "You c…can not…" she stuttered, trying, with all her might to look at him. "Y-you can… n-not help me."  
  
His voice was so soft she wanted to break. "Why won't you let me try?"  
  
She never intended to scream. Never intended for her voice to be so loud and shrill, like a banshee's cry, but when she suddenly spoke, all her fury and indignation at his betrayal formed her words into a hoarse, raven-like hoot of grief. "Because you fucking sent me back to him!" she yelped, her voice singed and ghastly. "How can you possibly help me? I should kill you, I should wring your bloody neck, I should gut you and serve your heart in the Great Hall, damn it," tears running all over her face, she suddenly leaned over the table, hastily scrabbling for one of the reserve scalpels she knew he kept in the upper drawer to the right. "Yes, I knew it would be here-" She snatched one and was about to plunge the blade into the skin of her left wrist, far too occupied to notice Snape's hand, which reached to capture hers in a deadly grip.  
  
Hermione gave a sharp cry of pain. "No!" she shrieked. "Release me! It hurts, it hurts, you idiot, it fucking hurts…!"  
  
"You give me that knife this instant, you bloody fool." He wrenched her wrist backwards, prying at her fingers.  
  
"All right!" screaming, she released her hold of the scalpel, which Snape hurried to take away. "I'm giving it to you, here it is, here, take it, just please let go of me, let go of me, and don't touch me…!" Sprawled on the table, she curled into a tight ball, heaving; loud, shrill sobs shaking her body. "I told her that he touched me and that I didn't like it-" Hermione yowled. "I asked her… I asked, if she would please please tell him to stop, and she said, she said, why," a sob crashed through her already torn lungs, "she said: whatever is the matter with you, Hermione, _can't you see that he loves you?_ "  
  
Behind her, she could hear Snape's robes rustling as he rose from his seat.  
  
She screamed. "Don't touch me!" Curling tighter still, her arms reached to cross protectively over her torso; red, raw hands, like claws over her face.  
  
A second later, he was crouching in front of her, kneeling on the floor of his office. His eyes, those cool, bubbling, mystical ponds, were looking for hers in the semi-darkness of the office. "Hermione, who are you talking about?" His voice hoarsened and he added, barely controlled now, " _Who touched you? Who wouldn't stop him from touching you?_ "  
  
She clearly heard the lethal note behind each syllable he spoke. Anger, but not directed at her. Directed at... someone else. Finally, someone else. Trembling, she lifted her eyes, bloodshot and teary, to look at him. Her mouth was dry. "My…my parents."  
  
Snape swore silently, never averting his gaze. "I should have known."  
  
She moistened her lips. "Please, please don't make me go home for Christmas."  
  
He shook his head. "It's not up to me, but I'll make sure you are allowed to stay at Hogwarts for Christmas."  
  
Good. So there would be no visiting home for her: no confronting Donna's lipstick worry and her father's… she choked, Lester would be so disappointed, and she wouldn't be able to look him in the eyes, nor would she be able to look at his hands, but then- it was the least of her problems at the moment. Consumed by her anger and her tripled sense of betrayal ever since the owls' arrival at breakfast, she finally managed to push away the one man who righted her. Not blindly ignoring who and what she was, but while seeing and accepting her flaws. She could not - _would not_ \- lose him; he was too important. He had every right to toss her out of his office, and she would probably deserve that: it would probably be enough to stir her into a cleansing lament and make her taste blood whenever she saw him in the future. _Want it or not, Snape, but for me you are a razor and I am wounded just looking at you_. The notion, she thought, it was enough to cut into her flesh- enough to form a substance sharp enough to cut into one's marrow. _Fuck you, Snape; I never meant you to become my homeport. Merlin knows you suck_.  
  
Forcing herself to breath, she ignored her fear of rejection and made herself look him in the eyes. "Do you still want me out of your life?" she uttered in s trembling voice.  
  
"I never wanted you out of my life."  
  
"Will you want me in your life after I'm graduated?"  
  
He seemed a little surprised to hear that, but he didn't say no, either.  
  
"Would you?" she pushed, overwhelmed by a sense of urgency.  
  
"If you still want me."  
  
She nodded. "I thought… well, I thought you might take me as your apprentice for the summer - your Potions apprentice," she clarified, "so that I can still stay here at the castle. I'll be going to University in November, but there is nothing to prevent us from seeing each other-"  
  
At that, Snape reached out a hand, sealing her mouth with the tip of his index finger and softly caressing her lips. "Let's see how the year ends," he said quietly. He didn't mention the war, but both of them knew it was the final battle - most likely due at the end of Harry Potter's final year at Hogwarts - that he was talking about. "First you all graduate, then we can see about this apprenticeship."  
  
"So…" she looked at him, unsure. "You don't… mind, me… us?"  
  
He looked worn. "I- I mind having slept with a student. I mind being used to assist self-mutilation," Snape sighed, running his hands through his fine, oily locks. "You are complex and obnoxious, and I don't have the time or the tools to deal with your complexity. And yet I am compelled; _bewitched_." He tilted his head, watching her with the same detached, impersonal look, as if she was a puzzle he was trying to solve. "I know that if I tap right here," slowly, as to not to scare her, he reached to touch two fingers to her forehead, "and if I touched you just this way…" the two fingers roamed to the pulse point under her ear, then wandered to her chest, just over her heart. "I know that you would click open, and there would be a land of milk and honey."  
  
She was hardly aware of his words until the hand fell aside, neither was she aware of him gingerly, tenderly touching her, up to the moment the words finally died on his lips. _I am desynchronizing him_ , she realized at a moment of clarity, _dissociating him when he says I'm beautiful: I tell myself there is Professor Snape and Snape the Druid while those are only masks he wears to hide. Even from himself. I ate my biscuits, Daddy_ , she cried silently: _I ate my biscuits and nothing was well. Why is it I keep dissociating my lover even though I no longer have to?_  
  
Gulping for air, she was painfully at a loss for words; unsure whether she should give up for the sudden hunger for the warmth and comfort of another body, or whether - for the sake of her own sanity - she better stay away and keep her distance. Pain was easy: it was something she knew, and up to certain degree, embraced. Over the years, she learned that the cleverest thing is to control her own pain, and controlling meant leveling. When she was the one causing herself the greatest pain, she had been safe. Even when at the risk of being mentally beaten to her last shard of sanity, she knew that afterwards, it could always be herself and her demons, and she could yet bleed _more_.  
  
Solace, however, was dangerous. Looking at him, she thought there was nothing more dangerous than solace. That she might reach for him, and that he might refuse her, and then there would be no more blood to extort. No dignity to spare. That by reaching for him, she was giving him the power to either restore, or break her, and that he might choose to withdraw. _Nonetheless_ , she mused, never bothering to withhold the tears, _I think I might break just from craving; just from being one twisted knot of hunger for your skin against mine_. "I think…" she began, her voice breaking, "I think I'd like you to hold me."  
  
Snape cocked an eyebrow, and yet, did not refuse, and to her almost breath-taking, convulsing relief, had quickly swept her into his arms. Having her request accepted brought another wave of tears: so light, so emancipating that she might actually be beautiful. _Is that your land of milk and honey? Hold me_ , she pleaded voicelessly. _I used to believe that deep inside there is a place no living soul is allowed, that one can only stand aside and watch us wither: touch me like Harry said one person can touch another; touch me out of the cupboard and out of my father's clutch; touch me out of my loneliness and out of your loneliness; touch us out of the metaphorical cage of our souls.  
  
Hold me until I'm cleansed…_  
  
"You can put your arms around my neck," she heard Snape murmur into her hair, his low, rich baritone stirring her into cold, dreaded realization. "You might find relief just in holding onto me."  
  
Hermione swallowed, stiffening at once. This was not at all what she asked for. "If sex is what you want right now-"  
  
"It isn't," he said softly. "Just like sex doesn't necessarily mean a cock; touch doesn't necessarily mean sex."  
  
Quietly, he made the way to his living quarters, where he sat - Hermione in his arms - in the leather covered armchair in front of the mantel. Reaching for his wand, Snape started a fire, and with the amber, gold and red flames shining in his eyes, reached to brush aside a stray lock of untamed hair, glued to her wet face. Taking her hand, he put it on his shoulder, then repeated this action with her other hand, shifting her body in his lap so she would feel most comfortable. At last, he tangled his fingers into her bird's nest hair, nestling her scalp in his palm, and rested her head against his torso.  
  
Hermione remembered crawling into Lester's lap, where it would be both comforting and dangerous, and her fingers unconsciously dug into the pale, tender skin of her lover's nape. She didn't know she was clinging to him, or that her teeth were biting into the cloth of his robes. She did know that there was warm body underneath her; a tear soaked fabric below her cheek and some desperate need to sink her teeth into something solid. She wanted to gnaw on her hand, and when he wouldn't let her, trapping her hand in his own, she bit into his palm, the saline ambiguity of tears and mucus mixing with the milky sweetness of the white-blue skin.  
  
Snape probably thought she was attempting to hurt herself again, and she was too submerged in her own misery to explain this to him, but this was not about self-mutilation and had nothing to do with pain. Biting and nibbling the delicate flesh of his hand, the stress had somehow faded; the acid buildups keeping her cognition in a state of high alertness warmed and slowly diffuse until she could feel her eyelids drop: a small child sucking on their thumb, lulled into an infant's sleep.  
  
It was a while before the wrenching subsided, and when it did, Hermione was surprised to realize she was still gently chewing on the curve of his palm, sometimes nibbling the long, elegant thumb; sometimes taking his index finger into her mouth and sucking on it.  
  
This spot, she knew, where Snape's index finger sloped back into his hand, just before the first metacarpal bone jutted from the base of the palm - where blue-white, almost transparent skin covered the concaved dent on which she could close her lips and suckle like a baby - _this exact spot_ \- was a haven.  
  
If only for her orally fixated self.  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \- "Tu quoque, Severe, amans mei?" - "You, too, Severus, my love?" (And thank Doomspark for the Latin).
> 
> \- "Hinc illae lacrimae." - "Hence these tears." Terence.


	18. All Too Familiar

_no man,if men aregods;but if gods must  
be men,the sometimes only man is this  
(most common,for each anguish is his grief;  
and,for his joy is more than joy,most rare)  
  
a fiend,if fiends speak truth;if angels burn  
  
by their own generous completely light,  
an angel;or(as various worlds he'll spurn  
rather than fail immeasurable fate)  
coward,clown,traitor,idiot,dreamer,beast --  
  
such was a poet and shall be and is  
  
\--who'll solve the depths of horror to defend  
a sunbeam's architecture with his life:  
and carve immortal jungles of despair  
to hold a mountain's heartbeat in his hand  
  
\-- e.e.cummings_  
  
  
  
Snape looked up from his essays when Hermione entered his classroom that evening after dinner. He hadn't expected to see her, but she would be a welcome distraction. He wanted to talk with her about the letter he and Minerva had written to her parents. She should be made aware. He watched as she warded the door, and then realized she was casting a particularly strong silencing charm. His eyebrow rose. That might bode well for further adventures in the dungeon...  
  
Hermione came to his desk, gently pushed aside a pile of essays, and slid herself onto the surface, close to him. He set down his quill and met her brown gaze. The pupils were large. He felt his body begin to stir; her eyes looked that way when she desired him. She spoke.  
  
"Bastard."  
  
In an instant all desire evaporated. Somewhere, somehow, she'd found out about the letter. He should have told her sooner. This would not be good. Snape sighed, already tired before the discussion had even begun. "We had an agreement," he said at last.  
  
"An agreement that you'd approach Professor McGonagall, so she would grant me her permission to leave Hogwarts during the school year, in order to visit St. Mungo's," she reminded him. Her tone was as cold as he had ever heard it. "An agreement, may I remind you, which had nothing to do with approaching my parents."  
  
"Professor McGonagall and I felt it would be best for you."  
  
Hermione's legs swung in and out of the cubbyhole of his desk, she was so close to him. She spoke again. "You thought it would be best for me, now did you? Didn't it even once occur to you I might differ with you?"  
  
"As I told you once, you may have to trust my judgment." To demonstrate that he was the one in control, he turned away briefly, organizing the stack of essays and popping his quill into the inkwell for storage.  
  
She nodded. "You also told me that at any time I can stand up and walk away. You didn't give me that choice, though."  
  
Now she was becoming tiresome. She needed to let go of this topic. It was unproductive. "I had your welfare in mind, Hermione."  
  
When she replied, her tone was soft and gentle. He thought he detected an undercurrent of malice, however, and watched her closely. "If you had my welfare in mind, you would not approached my parents," she said gently. "If you had your own welfare in mind, you would not have approached my parents." Her eyes were not on him as she spoke; they roamed the desk top, seeking something, or else she just didn't want to appear to be looking too closely at his reaction to her threat to expose their relationship, and ruin him.  
  
Snape leaned back in his chair, his eyes gleaming. He was torn somewhere between aggravation and amusement at her overreaction to the situation. He tried to control his tone when he replied, striving for sweetness, which, he knew, would put her on alert. "What is this game you're playing?"  
  
"I'm not playing. You warned me not to play games with you," she said. "And I, unlike yourself, bear such requests in mind."  
  
"Fine. A threat, then." Now his tone was darker. He did not care for her attitude. His apprentice needed taking down a peg or two for her insolence. Snape folded his arms.  
  
Hermione shook her head. "I don't make idle threats."  
  
"Really?" She was boring him, a small Gryffindor lioness spitting uselessly. She would not carry through on this threat; it would mean she could be expelled, at best transferred to somewhere like Beauxbatons, or what would be worse, forced to take her NEWTs at the Ministry with the home-schooled squibs, witches and wizards without talent or money enough to attend Hogwarts. He felt himself relaxing inside. This was, indeed, an idle threat. "Foolish girl. Go back to the sandbox where you belong."  
  
She looked down at him and rubbed her eyes with the heel of her hands. Snape wondered if she would cry. He understood why she hadn't wanted her professors to contact her parents about the problem with her hands, but for a child not to want to go home at Christmas...this he didn't understand at all. Himself, yes; there had been so much anger and devastation at home over the holidays when he was at school, but for Hermione to dread them was simply foolish. He supposed she was thinking of staying at Hogwarts, where the two of them could spend inordinate amounts of time together, doing...well, what they should not be doing. Still, that idea appealed to him. The two of them, closed into the small dark world of his dungeon quarters, day after day, Hermione always within reach of his long, sensitive fingers. Hmm. He would have to give this idea more thought. And yet -- if she stayed, and spent so much time with him, her absence among so few students would be noticed. _Fuck. No way to have this cake and eat it, too. Home for Christmas it must be. With, perhaps, a small visit from her professor, to let her show him the sights of her town...and the sensations...and..._  
  
When she spoke, her tone was tired; defeated; and he knew he had won. "Yes," she replied. "Soon enough I'll return to the sandbox. That is where you sent me and that is where I shall go. However, seeing that you betrayed my trust, I'll make sure you suffer the consequences."  
  
Wait. Now she had hit the ball back into his court, with some topspin on it. He arched an eyebrow at her and sat forward. "Explain yourself."  
  
Her eyes narrowed at him, and once again he saw himself in her face. More habits she had picked up from him. "Ah, Professor Snape. Darling Professor Snape. Notorious Head of Slytherin House, suddenly interested in the mentally ill Gryffindor Head Girl. Dear child," she mocked him prissily. "Just look at her hands! Those sore, red hands!"  
  
Snape put his palms flat on the desk surface and pushed himself to a standing position. He knew **exactly** where she was going with this little act, and what was worse -- it would work, without question. His face tightened as he glared at her. He shoved his face closer to hers menacingly, but remained silent. _The little bitch is standing her ground!_ He didn't know why he was so surprised by her spine; she'd been standing up to him more and more lately during the druid training, debating, disputing, and proving her theories.  
  
She kept talking, her gaze lifting with his as he rose. "Poor Miss Granger, she must be really disturbed to hurt herself this way, the little darling, such a bright girl she is… And this vile Potions Master, an ex Death Eater, you surely know, taking advantage of someone of her --"  
  
It was suddenly too much, her bringing his past into this argument. His horrid, ruinous past. "Enough! Enough!" Snape roared. "You ungrateful, little bitch --" and had to rock back when she slapped him across the face. His cheek stung. She'd put everything she had behind that blow. He felt rage boiling inside him. He struggled to master the urge to slap her back or at least grab her by the shoulders and shake her until she sobbed. He gritted his teeth, staring, white-hot.  
  
"You watch your mouth when speaking to me," she said hotly.  
  
"Well," he said at last. It was all he could manage, with so many emotions struggling for supremacy within him. Anger, fear, aggravation, fury, sadness, regret, rage. _And still she stands her ground, still she holds my gaze. Another student would be sobbing by now. How fierce she is. There...is...something more...here. Something else is giving her this strength_. He thought hard for a moment. _Unwilling to go home for Christmas. Desperate. Anything is better, even baiting the Potions Master into a fury. What is at home, Hermione? What lurks there?  
  
Angharad: "Take yourself off, Severus, and don't come back. Leave my book here. I am tired of this nonsense of yours. I am not your pawn, nor will I permit this religion to become your weapon against others."  
  
He had brought one of Angharad's scrying mirrors into the Circle, and had enchanted it to allow him to see his parents with it, to spy on his abusive father. After a glimpse at the latest savagery, Severus had begun spelling a long-distance cursing via the mirror. He had not done it meaning to pervert Angharad's Circle or subjugate it to his will; it was just that the Circle was so peaceful, and helped him to focus. He had not considered what Angharad would think of his actions. And now, with her showing him his sin, he was horrified at himself. To think he had tainted her with his deadly hatred. And worse, it was not himself who had stopped him: it had been Angharad. He hadn't recognized his own evil.  
  
"What? No! We haven't finished studying." He put his palms flat on the top of the ancient book, caressing the leather. He could not let it go, it mustn't leave his hands. Everything he needed was inside it, except for Lily Evans.  
  
"I will not be baited."  
  
"I do not bait you."  
  
"I will not argue, either. What you are doing, by bringing that Dark magic into my Circle, is the same as blasphemy." Her face was pale; he had never seen her look that way. Strangely, her control over her fury was more frightening than his father's violence had ever been, because there was no way to combat it. He did not understand her fury, because it did not hold the heat of hatred.  
  
Severus' brows drew together. In attempting to explain himself, he had tried to tell her that his father, in his wickedness and brutality, deserved whatever evil could be visited upon him. But in his heavy-handed way Severus had denigrated her beliefs and hurt her. And now she was hurting him back, taking away the one thing that promised a surcease from pain, a way back to humanity: the peace of the rituals, the power of the Stones, the structure and study of druidic life.  
  
He knelt at Angharad's feet, next to the old table, scarred with scorch marks from how many meals, and nicked from how many generations of children, banging spoons? The scrying mirror lay shattered on the floor across the room, where she had thrown it before wandlessly exploding it into glittering needles of glass. He crawled to her, laying his face in her lap, holding hard to her womanly hips, feeling the cloth of her robe smooth against his cheek. "I'm sorry," he whispered. Lily, I loved you so. I couldn't tell you. I am my father's son. "I beg of you. Please forgive me."  
  
It took many minutes, but finally her hands rested on his head and stroked his hair. "My apprentice," she whispered to him. "It's you and your victim who must forgive you, not me. Come now, to your chair. You have a lesson to learn, and prayers to say before dawn. You have placed a stain on someone's soul, a mark as dark as the Mark on your arm. I need to know that you understand this. And then you must lift that stain."  
  
Severus wept, knowing himself vile. It was a long time before he could rise from the floor. He did not deserve her forgiveness, yet she gave it anyway._  
  
He could not have said why the memory of Angharad's fury at finding him in her Circle with the scrying mirror surfaced now. It fled through his mind with the swiftness of a bird's wing. Something about it pulled at him, taunted him. He thought he could see Hermione in his youthful self -- had he, secretly, wanted Angharad to condemn him, to punish him, to validate his own terrible opinion of himself? What would it have accomplished, except to drive Angharad away from him? And here was Hermione, threatening something equally final in ruining his reputation. _Yes. She wants to take this irrevocable step; to cause an upheaval that would take weeks to resolve, and require her presence at Hogwarts_. At this realization, calmness poured over Snape. He kept watching Hermione. He was able to speak, now that he saw she was pulling him into her problem in order to save herself from going home at Christmas. She would even go so far as to cost him his job, the respect he had worked so hard to earn, and her own chance at graduating with her Housemates. What he still could not understand, however, was _why_.  
  
"Well. I'm removing myself from your chessboard," he said at last. He wondered what she would do now that he had handed her his life, his work, and the respect of his peers. "Go and implement your little scheme, you're free to go. I won't contradict you. However, I won't be your substitute for a razor. If you wish to hurt yourself, go do it somewhere else. You won't have me as a willing participant, Hermione."  
  
She stared at him. "It's not like that."  
  
He sighed. "I don't believe you. Now, the door is that way. Please see yourself out." He sat down again, reaching for his papers and quill. This nonsense was over. Snape tried to focus on the essays, but was stopped by her tearful cry.  
  
"I told you, _it's not like that!_ "  
  
Snape tilted his head to look at her again, leaning forward, lacing his fingers. "Isn't it? Then tell me, Hermione, how is it, exactly?" A sob escaped her and she looked away from him. He heard her taking calming breaths that were still ragged.  
  
Hermione looked at him again, finally, more fiercely, the sobs under control. "Even if it was like that, it is none of your God damn business," she said through gritted teeth.  
  
" _The hell it isn't_ ," Snape retorted. "It became my bloody business the moment you made me a part of it."  
  
"I never forced myself on you."  
  
There was a long moment of silence. Snape's gaze trapped her. When he spoke, he was careful to enunciate clearly. There must be no mistaking who was at fault here, and it was not he. " _You never let me help you either_."  
  
She closed her eyes, and in that moment he knew he had reached her, but he had wounded her, too. She stammered her reply. "You c…can not…Y-you can… n-not help me."  
  
 _Merlin. What is so wrong? What?_ Snape almost whispered, he was so confused. "Why won't you let me try?"  
  
"Because you fucking sent me back to him!" Her shrieking harpy's voice startled him beyond belief. "How can you possibly help me?" she went on, screaming and sobbing at the same time. "I should kill you, I should wring your bloody neck, I should gut you and serve your heart in the Great Hall, damn it!"  
  
Snape flinched back in the face of that volume, that ferocity, that raggedness.  
  
She leaned forward, scrabbling madly in the upper drawers of his desk. Tears sprang from her eyes and streamed over her cheeks, more tears than he had ever seen someone shed. Her red hand suddenly pounced on something in the upper right hand drawer.  
  
"Yes, I knew it would be here --" Her words were harsh after she had torn her throat with her screaming, but her tone was triumphant and he stared in horror at the glittering silver blade of a scalpel in her claws. He was almost too late to stop her as she tried to plunge the blade into the skin of her left wrist. Snape's hand shot out and captured her own in a death grip. _You will not do this, you will not do this to yourself!_  
  
Hermione gave a sharp cry of pain. "No!" she shrieked. "Release me! It hurts, it hurts, you idiot, it fucking hurts…!"  
  
"You give me that knife this instant, you bloody fool." He wrenched her wrist backwards, prying desperately at her fingers, trying not to get cut himself. In this state, she might turn the blade on him, as well.  
  
"All right!" Screaming, she released the scalpel. "I'm giving it to you, here it is, here, take it, just please let go of me, let go of me, and don't touch me…!" He snatched at its handle and flung it at the wall. Dimly he heard it tinkling on the stone floor, but all his attention was now focused on controlling this wild animal in his office  
  
Something in her voice, the anguished plea, made him release her. Never had he heard her speak so. She collapsed onto his desk, sending papers flying, and curled into a fetal position, sobbing shrilly. "I told her that he touched me and that I didn't like it -- I asked her… I asked, if she would please please tell him to stop, and she said, she said, why," fresh, new wrenching sobs tore from her throat. "She said: whatever is the matter with you, Hermione, _can't you see that he loves you?_ "  
  
 _I'm not hearing this. This horror doesn't touch her world. Not her Muggle dentist world, the perfect family, no, no, no... He rose, an all too familiar coldness welling into his belly, his bowels, his testicles. Mother -- why does Father hold you down -- why are you bleeding --why does he hit you -- I cannot help you --_  
  
She screamed. "Don't touch me!" Her hands flew to cover her face, her elbows over her breasts.  
  
He shifted to crouch in front of her, searching for her eyes, seeking to see into her torture. "Hermione, who are you talking about?" His voice hoarsened and he added, barely controlled now, " _Who touched you? Who wouldn't stop him from touching you?" Tell me who did it, and I will kill them for you. I will kill them for me. I will kill them for Mother._  
  
When she looked at him, her eyes were red and full of tears, still splashing. "My…my parents."  
  
 _Fuck. Stupid, Snape, stupid of you. How unobservant. All the signs were there, you just didn't read them. All you could see was a woman-child who desired you, a woman-child who could make your Stones come to life._ "I should have known."  
  
Her tongue flicked out nervously to moisten her lips. "Please, please don't make me go home for Christmas."  
  
"It's not up to me, but I'll make sure you are allowed to stay at Hogwarts for Christmas."  
  
She was still trying to read his eyes. Her voice trembled when she spoke. "Do you still want me out of your life?"  
  
He read such devastation in her eyes, heard it in her voice. He could not lie to her. "I never wanted you out of my life."  
  
"Will you want me in your life after I'm graduated?"  
  
Snape couldn't speak. How often had he asked himself that question over the last few days? Except it had been reversed: would Hermione want **him** in **her** life?  
  
"Would you?" She pressed.  
  
"If you still want me."  
  
"I thought… well, I thought you might take me as your apprentice for the summer - your Potions apprentice, so that I can still stay here at the castle. I'll be going to University in November, but there is nothing to prevent us from seeing each other --"  
  
He closed his eyes a moment. Then he reached out with his index finger and stopped the flow of her words. "Let's see how the year ends," he said quietly, exhausted now that the worst of the storm seemed to be over and there was only the aftermath. _We both know Voldemort is coming for us all. And soon. Let's not make plans._ "First you all graduate, then we can see about this apprenticeship."  
  
"So…you don't… mind, me… us?"  
  
 _Oh, Hermione, I am so very tired. How do you cope with this inside you?_ He sighed heavily. "I -- I mind having slept with a student. I mind being used to assist self-mutilation. You are complex and obnoxious, and I don't have the time or the tools to deal with your complexity. And yet I am compelled; _bewitched_. " He looked at her gently. "I know that if I tap right here," slowly, so as to not to scare her, he reached to touch two fingers to her forehead, "and if I touched you just this way…" his two fingers touched the pulse point under her ear, and then a spot just over her heart. "I know that you would click open, and there would be a land of milk and honey." _And such riches will never be mine._  
  
She stared at him blankly for the longest time. It was as if she hadn't heard him. Her voice broke as she spoke. "I think…I think I'd like you to hold me."  
  
 _This...oh, this...I can do_. Snape lifted her into his arms, dragging her from the desk, one arm beneath her knees, the other around her shoulders, tucking her head beneath his chin. "You can put your arms around my neck," Snape murmured to her now. "You might find relief just in holding onto me."  
  
Hermione stiffened in his hold and he feared he would drop her. "If sex is what you want right now --"  
  
 _Merlin! What did her father do to her?_ "It isn't," he said softly. "Just like sex doesn't necessarily mean a cock; touch doesn't necessarily mean sex." When she relaxed into his hold at his words, he left the classroom and carried her to his quarters, where he sank into an armchair in front of the fire. Holding her -- just...holding her, was all he could do for her now.  
  
  
Snape awakened with a start, a heavy weight pressing upon him, holding him down, trapping him. That dream again... his mother, her length stretched on the parlor floor, turning on her side and drawing up her knees to her chest, trying to protect herself from a well-aimed boot toe to her belly, and instead the blow struck a kidney. It never got any better, it never changed. Small Severus ran forward to help, and a clubbed fist swung him out of the way to land heavily, head first, against a trunk where a heavy vase tottered and fell, shattering like a bomb.  
  
It took only moments to place himself: in his quarters, in the large leather-covered armchair, before his fireplace. It took longer for his racing pulse to quiet. Hermione nestled on his lap, sleeping the sleep of the exhausted, the broken. Judging from the lack of light from the small, high windows, it was still night. How long had they been here like this?  
  
It all flooded back. The meeting with Minerva. Writing a letter to Hermione's parents. Hermione herself, raging in his office, trying to hurt herself, desperate to stop pain, in any way possible. Himself bending back her wrist, wrenching away that scalpel, flinging it at the wall. And finally, the truth coming out of her. A terrible truth, one that still burned into his brain like a white-hot dagger. Like nothing he had ever thought possible for her perfect life, her perfect family.  
  
Who touched her? Her father. Who wouldn't stop him from touching her? Her mother. Never, never would Snape allow her to go home again. Not alone, at any rate. He would be with her, he decided. No more conjugal visits with daddy, he thought. Not for his student, his apprentice, his bedmate, _his_.  
  
Her arms were around his neck, limp and heavy in her sleep. She had finally released his hand, after the curious biting and sucking, that somehow didn't seem destructive but instead gave her comfort. His fingers were slightly abraded, but more or less whole. She seemed to prefer that tender web of flesh between thumb and forefinger, on the back of his partially closed hand. Snape, in his confusion and desperation to control the pain, the fear, the overwhelming sense of betrayal she must have felt, had allowed her to suckle at his hand like a babe. Just before she slept, she released his hand and shifted to press her hot face into the curve of his neck, snuffling there, smelling his scent. He couldn't quite hear what it was she was whispering, but shortly she became a rag doll in his arms, and he knew she was soothed into sleep.  
  
Gods. He was stiff from sitting so long. The muscles in his legs tingled, half asleep. He shook her gently. "Hermione." She did not stir. He shook her again. "Hermione."  
  
She mumbled, but that was all. Snape groaned and struggled to slide to the front of the armchair, with her still in his arms. He got his feet under his hips and rose. She stirred at that, with a shrill cry of anguished fright.  
  
"It's Snape," he said to her. "You know me, Hermione. I'm putting you to bed."  
  
Hermione stiffened in his arms and he nearly dropped her. "Be still, you foolish girl!" he snapped. His sarcastic tone seemed to reach through her frozen demeanor and started her breathing more normally. "I'm only taking you to bed. To sleep," he added hastily, in case the demon within her was still lurking close to the surface.  
  
Snape set her on the bed and debated about undressing her. He decided against it, except for her shoes, which he removed with a charm and banished beneath the bed, next to his slippers. She'd been sleeping in her clothes and school robes; let her stay that way. He pulled a spare blanket over her, thought a moment, then stripped to his boxers, and cuddled behind her, spoon-fashion.  
  
Though Hermione was soon asleep again in that peculiar depressive state, Snape was not. He found himself pondering the similarities and differences of their separate childhoods. Hermione, touched by her father in ways she should not have been. Severus, a captive audience of one, lurker in dark corners and under beds, watching his father strike his mother for unclear reasons. Hermione, helpless to fight against the years of paternal authority ingrained in her brain. Severus, fighting, always. Struck for it, always. Hermione, left to the tender mercies (and Snape had no doubt they were tender, if unnatural; Hermione was a delectable morsel, sweet, sharp, passionate) of her father, by a mother who appeared not to notice something was wrong. Severus, whose mother knew what was wrong, yet could not struggle against it, even for her child, much less for herself.  
  
Hermione, who coped by hurting herself. Severus, who coped by hurting others. Both driven to brilliance and excellence in their magical studies, sensing freedom might lie in knowledge and power. Hermione with her yoga and fitness training, seeking to control her physical self. And Druid Snape, seeking solace in religion, and control through ritual.  
  
It was too much to think about now. He buried his face in her hair, inhaling her scent deeply into his lungs, his brain. She smelled slightly acrid, no doubt a residue of her distress, but mostly she smelled warm and faintly green, like something growing in the Forbidden Forest. Like a tender shoot from one of those black roses, not a bloom, but a stem, with a thorn.  
  
Snape slept again, one arm across her belly, the other pillowing his head.  
  
  
  
He was wakened by the sensation of soft, warm lips, trailing down his body. Slowly stirring, he gazed down his body. He could see Hermione's eyes glinting in the twilight before dawn like those of a cat's. The terrified, desperate child from the night before was gone, replaced by the lush-lipped Lolita he remembered well from prior encounters. Suddenly flooded by a sharp sensation of wrongness, he reached his hand to stop her.  
  
"Hermione, don't --"  
  
"You don't mean that," she said to him, continuing her slow kissing down towards his navel and beyond. "I can tell." Her hand slid softly over the fly of his boxers. Snape jumped at her touch.  
  
"Stop, I said." _Damnation, it can't be this way. Not yet._  
  
"Why?" Knowing smile. "You want me, I can feel it. Here. This wants me, if you don't..." She bent her head and Snape thrust his hand into her hair to stop her, pull her face back up.  
  
"No, Hermione."  
  
"Oh, God, oh..." Her face fell at once, and again, there was the lonely, helpless girl who lay curled into a ball on his desk. "I knew it."  
  
"Knew what? _Lumos_." He released her.  
  
She rolled her eyes in his bluish wandlight, as if talking to an extremely retarded child. "Just… Just drop it." Sliding off the bed, she began groping for her own wand. He watched conflicting emotions flit across her features, until at last the emotion that settled, devastation, seemed to fill her eyes. She tried to speak.  
  
"What is it?" he muttered. This was nonsense. Snape understood her distress about her home situation, but last night he had agreed she could stay at Hogwarts over Christmas. It should have eased her mind. He sat up and swung his legs off the bed. She crossed her arms, as if daring him to step nearer.  
  
"You know, now."  
  
He didn't pretend to misunderstand her; that would have been deliberately cruel to her while she was in this state. "Yes. He touched you, and she wouldn't stop him."  
  
"Evidently so."  
  
He was stunned by her calmness. She seemed to sense that.  
  
"What should I do, Snape? Do you want me to scream? Cry? Yell? Wasn't yesterday enough for you? Or did you want an encore?"  
  
He shook his head. "As I already said, Hermione, I won't play this game with you. If you're looking for someone to hurt you, find some other masochist."  
  
"Prick," she hissed. "You do want me to cry now, now don't you?"  
  
"I want you to express some emotion, yes."  
  
"I cried my heart out last night," she said at last, with a sadness that almost overwhelmed him. "It didn't change history."  
  
"I want to ask you to come back to bed," he said, "It's cold here. Come and talk to me."  
  
"No."  
  
"Why not?" He stood up, turned back the blankets, then folded the spare blanket and put it on the trunk at the foot of the bed. "It will be no different than it was last night, just warmer."  
  
"You'll never want to touch me again, now that you know." She stayed where she was.  
  
"Utter rot," he said.  
  
"Well, you certainly didn't sound like you want me, a moment or two ago."  
  
"Hermione, you're offering yourself to me for all the wrong reasons. It would have been wrong -- even cruel -- to accept your offer. Sex doesn't solve problems, it causes problems. And Merlin, I know it. I can't say something as stupid as 'Hermione, you just need a hug' because you need so much more than that to make your world right." His hands clenched. He wanted to go to her, take her in his arms, bring her back to bed, soothe her with the sex she thought she needed. It would be easy. But it wouldn't be right, and it wouldn't help for long, just the way the ritual washing never helped for long. Sex was a palliative, and not a cure.  
  
She cried in despair. "But don't you see I n-need you?" she stuttered, holding out her arms to him, her poor, red arms. "Please. I need you to make me right. I need you to make me --"  
  
As Snape watched, her face crumpled and she brought her hands up to cover it. He went to her after all, unable to watch her torn open this way without touching her. His hands floated just to the sides of her shoulders, and finally settled like two dragonflies, lightly, yet gripping. At the touch, she cried out, anguished, but then she pushed forward and rammed her face into his bare chest.  
  
Snape spoke. "If you tell me one more time that you're not clean, Hermione...I'll..." he trailed off. His hands slid down her arms and moved to her back, warm on the fabric of her shirt.  
  
"You'll...what?" She didn't look at him until he touched her chin and raised her face. Her agony devastated him.  
  
"Come to bed. Let me hold you."  
  
She stumbled along with him, to where it was warm. "Where are my shoes?" she mumbled.  
  
"The unbelievably stupid things that worry you," he muttered, arranging the pillows so he could lean back against the headboard for support. Sitting up seemed a less sexually charged position, though he would not have made love to her now if she'd begged on her hands and knees. There was still too much to talk about. Snape settled himself, and held out his arms. With a moan, she curled against him and pulled one of his arms around her. She was trembling.  
  
"What if we're late for breakfast?" she said now. "We'll be missed, we'll be caught..."  
  
"Two more stupid topics. I want to talk to you, seriously."  
  
That made her tense in his arms. For a moment he thought she would break away again. "I will not talk about my father."  
  
"You _will_ talk about your father."  
  
She moved away from him at once. "This conversation is over, Snape. I'll thank you for telling me where you hid my shoes --"  
  
"Hermione, this is important."  
  
"Why, because you say it is?"  
  
"No, because it _is_ important, and if you weren't so busy hiding away from yourself, you would realize it too. Now come here this instant." Once again he held out his arms.  
  
Surprisingly pliant, she sank on the bed, limp as a rag doll, looking at him with large, pleading eyes, as if begging him please not to hurt her.  
  
"About your father --"  
  
"I love my father. I won't sit here and listen to you condemn him!"  
  
"Well then, what would you accept from me in regards to your father, if not my condemnation? I condemn him for what he's done to you. Why don't you?"  
  
When she finally answered, it was slowly. "It's...it's much more...complicated than that." It was clear that this conversation was making her uncomfortable. Moments ago she had been limp and compliant; now the lurking demon was peeping out from her eyes.  
  
This, Snape simply could not comprehend. He hated his own father for what had been done to young Severus and his mother. "You must hate what he did, at least."  
  
Hermione colored as he looked down at her.  
  
"...don't you?" Snape asked, his brows drawing together. His arms were still out. At all costs, she must know she was welcomed into them.  
  
Her lips tightened. She looked like she was about to take wing from the bed, poised to fly her way back to Gryffindor tower. "I am not going to talk about it." Rapid shakes of her head, confusion reigning on her face, and then, "Oh, God..." and a moment later she buried her face against his chest, hiding in her tumbled hair. At last he could close his arms around her.  
  
"How will we ever get past this, otherwise?" he asked her now, softly. "I can't wash your hands at every moon ritual. I can't fuck you into oblivion, Hermione! I can't and won't make you forget." A dawning realization stunned him and his voice grew even softer. "And I can't save you." _Oh, but I **could** Obliviate you, Hermione, I could help you that way, I could take it all away, I could make a Pensieve for you...make you **not** you. UnHermione. And then you would walk away from me. _It was almost too much for him to bear. His heart was racing. "You asked me last night if I will want you in my life after your graduation. My answer is yes, but the other side of that question must be true as well, Hermione. Will you still want _me_? And to know the answer to that question, we must talk this out. I may be as old as your father --"  
  
"Stop talking about him, I said -- stop!" She tried to sit up again and pull away, but this time he would not let her. He prayed she would not feel trapped, and drew a hand soothingly down her back. She stayed, but she was very tense, all her muscles thrumming like violin strings.  
  
"As I said, I am so much older than you. As old as he is, perhaps. But have no illusions, Hermione -- I am not your father and have no intention of behaving as such. I will not parent you. But above all I will not have you thinking I want to touch you in the way he touched you." He took a deep breath. The next was too hard to say, just now: _And if that's what you want from me, Hermione, if you want a new daddy, then go home now. Home to daddy. Unwholesome though I am, I want Hermione the woman, not Hermione the child. I am under no illusions here._  
  
"Oh, God."  
  
"God is not in this. Only you, and I, and your parents." He took her hand and placed it over his heart. "Feel this. That beat, that pounding, is for you." _Lily, how much you taught me, and never knew you were teaching me_.  
  
"I will still want you," she whispered. "But I won't talk about my father." She pressed her ear where he had pressed her hand. Snape closed his eyes, and put one hand on her head, threading into her curls.  
  
"Do you think you ever could?" he asked, as gently as he knew how, which was not very gently. He needed this information in order to solve this problem for both of them.  
  
"I don't know." Her mouth turned against his chest in a warm, moist kiss that somehow held everything, and nothing, of desire, at one and the same time. "But you still want me," she whispered.  
  
"God yes." He could only groan his answer, and clench his hand in her hair.  
  
She had one last thing to say. "I'm glad."  
  
They were silent for a long time. Snape still wanted to press her for answers, but clenched his teeth hard enough to give himself a migraine instead. He sank into thought, closing his eyes. How to get the answers he needed. Perhaps a visit to the Granger's home, with Minerva in tow, so he would not explode and throttle the father.  
  
Hermione stirred him later, prodding him with two sharp fingers in a tender spot near his floating ribs.  
  
"Stop that," he muttered, opening his eyes as he reached to still her fingers.  
  
"You need to get up," she told him. "Breakfast. Classes."  
  
"You're always thinking of food."  
  
"You don't think about food enough. Look how gaunt you are. You need more protein. You will eat bacon this morning. Or kippers." She pulled her hand free and ran her fingers over his ribs as though she were pulling a mallet along a xylophone.  
  
He narrowed his eyes at her. "You seem a little better."  
  
"Perhaps," she said. "I would say thank you, but you wouldn't like that."  
  
"Whyever not?"  
  
"You don't like people to be grateful to you. Just...worshipful. In awe. Fearful."  
  
Lily. "You loved to be feared." How alike they were, his two Gryffindor loves, and yet, how different. He must stop this nonsense of entangling himself with his most polar of opposites. They knew him too well, saw too deeply into him. Their angles were not his angles, but they fit closely, nonetheless.  
  
"So instead you would prefer I think you ungrateful."  
  
"You don't think that at all." She lifted his hand, the one she had bitten, and examined it closely. "Did I hurt you, last night?"  
  
"Not my hand," he said.  
  
"But I hurt you?"  
  
"You bring back bad memories."  
  
Hermione's brows drew together. "In what way?"  
  
"It's not important. Let's just say I had parental issues, too."  
  
Her eyes gleamed at him. She settled herself closer, where she could look right into his face, deep into his eyes. She searched there for a long moment. "I want you to tell me." Looking back, he could still see a faint shadow lurking in her brown eyes, and dark circles beneath them.  
  
"Not today."  
  
"Now is a good time, I could bypass breakfast just this once."  
  
"Perhaps someday soon we will trade our tragedies. I will give you my parents, and you will give me yours." His hands lifted, almost tentatively, to touch her, close gently on her hips. She didn't flinch. He shook her, just a little. "You need a bath, Hermione."  
  
"Do I smell?" Hermione was almost smiling. "Because you do," she said. She dropped her nose to his chest, and her breath huffed over his skin. He was reminded abruptly of a horse he'd once been introduced to, at Lucius' estate. The same tender skin, the same alertness, the rush of breath and flaring nostrils, the wariness, watching for any sudden movement, ready to bolt. "You smell of bitter herbs, and charcoal, and lab cleaner. And me." She lifted her head, blinking. "Come and have a bath with me, Snape."  
  
"Hermione." He closed his eyes, shaking his head. _Don't do this, don't tempt me so. It's too soon for you, too fresh a scar._ "I will not make love to you this morning. I will not do it. And not because we might miss breakfast, wench that you are."  
  
She understood his hesitation. She pulled him up from the bed with her and twined close, her pointed chin pressing painfully at his sternum. "I know. What I meant to say was, come and bathe me, Snape. That's all."  
  
He sighed. He bent his head and kissed that warmly upturned mouth. Kissed it deeply, wanting her so much. "That I can do. Go and draw your tub."  
  
She looked over her shoulder at him as she wandered away, shedding her clothes and leaving them like Hansel and Gretel's breadcrumbs behind her from bed to bath. "A hot one, with bubbles for your sudden modesty, Snape. But after Double Potions class, you'd better have wards ready."  
  
 _Merlin, yes -- and new ones, since Draco can break the old ones_. He walked to the bath after her, picking up her clothes and burying his face in them. Smelling that acrid smell, that desperation, to remind him that sex in his enormous bath was out of the question, at least this morning.


	19. A Match Made in Earth

"I see you altering history.  
I see you abusing the land.  
I see you, your selective amnesia,  
And I love you still.  
And I love you still."  
  
\-- Still. Alanis Morissette.  
  
  
A strong, forceful blow of wandless magic hurled her against the wall, knocking the air out of her lungs. Harry was damn powerful, and he knew it. Both of them knew it. In fact, it was Hermione who urged him to use his powers against her: Hermione who would tease him into fury, until he could master enough strength to summon the needed power to hurl her against the wall. Fury. Love. Hate. All strong emotions.  
  
For Harry Potter to be able to summon his magic without a wand meant he had to be worked up into the brightest, most eye-scalding feeling on his emotional scale. Anger was easy to be probed out of him: he had so much anger in him that Hermione was sometimes overwhelmed. Anger at the world, for stealing his parents at such young age. Anger at the Dursleys for abusing and mistreating him. For locking him in the cupboard. Anger at Dumbledore, for using a seventeen-year-old boy to fight the Wizarding World's war: sharpening and polishing him for years without ever asking for his consent. Anger for never being allowed to have a normal life.  
  
Hate was rarer. Harry hated only three people: Bellatrix Lestrange, who killed the one man Harry viewed as a parental figure. Peter Pettigrew, who gave Harry's parents to the Dark Lord. And Voldemort himself, who, in his maddened obsession, chased one child from the cradle and into a future, bloodied battlefield, in which Harry had every intention of erasing Voldemort off the face of the earth.  
  
But then, neither anger, nor hate, would bring Harry's power into its outmost materialization. When she wanted him to produce a lethal stroke, when she wanted his magic to appear in its cleanest, strongest form, she'd ask him to think about his mystery lover, and being outside of the cupboard. With his love.  
  
At that, she could practically see Harry's power stream from his bowels; his blood; his guts. It seemed to gather at the tips of his fingers, and glow from the upper layer of his dermis until he was sizzling with it. Sometimes he would close his eyes, which would literally burn with his love, so vivid she thought she might burn with it herself, and channel his magic - without his wand, but through his bare hands and with the power of his mind alone - to do his bidding.  
  
For Hermione, however, summoning her magic was an act of sheer will. Always an outstanding student, her power was in her razor sharp intellect and her ability to put it into full use at time of need. She might never be as strong as Harry, but having a thorough knowledge of herself - physically and mentally - and having achieved a considerable mastery of her body and mind through meticulous training, she knew exactly from which points to draw power. Her stroke, therefore, was of considerable force.  
  
Looking at her opponent, who was observing her from a safe distance, Hermione breathed deeply. Combat with either of her friends - especially Harry - was never easy. Today was no exception. _Bloody Merlin_. In front of her, Harry was already summoning the power for another spell. She had to move quickly.  
  
Basking in the power of the universe, the same power which would wake Snape's Stones to life, she reached into the marrow of her being and the wide, ever becoming entity of the universe, to call on the power she needed.  
  
Gasping, sweat dripping from her forehead and into her strongly defined eyebrows, she launched a forceful blow at Harry- who threw himself aside, rolled over, and landed on his feet at the other side of the room.  
  
She groaned, waving her hands. "No no no! Just how many times do I have to tell you? You're not doing it right, Harry! Imagine we're on the field of battle; I'm on your right, Ron at your left, and some black clad figure is launching a Killing Curse at you! Which side would you throw yourself? Toward me, busy casting a protection shield? Or toward Ron, who would be guarding your left side?"  
  
Harry wiped the shiny film of sweat congealing on his forehead. "Yeah, you're right. I'm sorry, Hermione. Another try?"  
  
She blinked tiredly. "I think I need some rest. Ron?"  
  
The tall redhead, who had been watching them from his place on a comfortable looking pouf in front of the fire, rose up. He was stretching lazily as he moved toward Harry. "Just wait a couple of minutes while I warm up."  
  
Hermione sighed. Some of their argument from the previous night still reflected in the two boys' strained voices. Nevertheless, they were doing their best to be polite to each other.  
  
Harry shrugged his shoulders. "No problem with me."  
  
Ron's magic, she mused, watching her ex-boyfriend stretching his long limbs, had stemmed from his loyalty. From his earth deep sense of belonging and protectiveness. If Godric Gryffindor was alive, she thought once, that would be the source of his magic. Good old, teddy-bear Ron. No abusive relatives for him. Ron never knew how deep and dark was the cupboard, or what lurked in Father's embrace. Ron's sense of belonging, she knew, was utter and complete. And Weasleys defended their own, even if it meant dying in the process. Too many people had mistaken the Weasleys for a bunch of harmless, penniless do-gooders, never realizing their strength was in their unity. Hermione, knowing Ron probably better than anyone else, was careful never to mistake his absentminded sweetness for powerlessness.  
  
Both Ron and Harry, she thought, were worthy opponents.  
  
A little sore from the combat with Harry, she joined in Ron's stretching. An acid buildup was only to be expected and some exercise might prevent the muscle cramps which followed. Several minutes later, with her body more limber, Hermione made her way to the pouf Ron had occupied until only a while ago. Sighing, she sank into the soft seat.  
  
Immediately, she found herself surrounded by Ron's scent: beeswax and wool, along with the sharp sweetness of the sugar-quills he liked to suck on; always making the point just bellow his ear sticky and smelling of molten sugar, as he forgot it was a sweet he was holding and began to play with it. This, and the deeper, masculine scent wafting from his skin; his armpits, his pulse points, his scrotum: an undercurrent of sexual awareness that never existed between her and Harry. Nevertheless, Hermione was delighted to find out that when she lifted the collar of her shirt, burying her nose inside and sniffing, she could still detect Snape's fragrance clinging to her body.  
  
They had spent the night together, in his room, after a long tiring lesson about power and its abuse. Yes, she thought. He wouldn't talk to her about her father until she agreed, but he would do everything to make her face the subject. Sometimes she would call him a lousy Slytherin, claiming he was subtle as any Gryffindor attempting to cheat on an exam. Sometimes she recognized it for determination, and would be compelled by his resolve.  
  
 _"Feel this,"_ his words would swirl in and out of focus in her mind. _"That beat, that pounding, is for you."_  
  
She wished she could fight him; perhaps like she did with Harry and Ron. To crawl into his embrace, the way she once crawled into Lester's hug, and find comfort in those arms which inflicted both pleasure and pain. She needed Snape to ruin her so he could save her, but he refused to do either, only hold her when she clung to him, as if he was her one true north in a foggy sea of milky twilight.  
  
How long, she wondered, would it take her to break him? How long until he became her pawn or her king - or until he would yell at her to get the hell out of his life? _What is wrong with me that I can't stand this equilibrium_ , she thought desperately. _What is wrong with me that it makes me shivery and afraid; fighting to breathe?_ Yes, he had been right- in a sense; she wanted another daddy, another Lester - or another Donna. But not because she thought her relationship with each of her parents formed an archetype that had translated into the kind of relationship she wanted to have. Merely because, alongside the tarot card from which she and her father would look at her forever, entangled in a sickly, sweaty mass of limbs (with Lester raising Godric Gryffindor's sword to decapitate his daughter's bent head) she would always come across the Hermit. The rims of the Hermit's white, feathered clock would be swirling around their body, and their face would be the face of Hermione's eleven year old self.  
  
This was the thing Snape refused to understand: that where there was Hermione, there were always her archetypes, following her like a herd of black lambs.  
  
"It is just the same with you," she said heatedly, angry that she couldn't drag him into the violent, heated sex the she wanted. That she could not force him to hurt her.  
  
Snape lifted a brow, slowly laying her down on his bed, his clever, skilled fingers skimming down the angle of her jaw, to the hollow at the base of her neck, gentle as butterfly wings.  
  
"Use your head for a moment," she demanded, forcing herself to ignore the tip of his index finger which settled into her supra sternal notch. It was a battle of wills, and she knew it - which would be first, to distract the other: she, in her sharpened rage, or he, seducing her into momentary bliss. _Too gentle, laddie. You can't win me. Not this way._  
  
"Just think of it, Snape," she continued. "Why me? Why me of all people?"  
  
"Why you?" he asked, leaning to close his lips around a painfully erected nipple, all of a sudden biting the hardened tip, in a move so unexpected and so correlated with her own wishes that she cried. "Please tell me, as you seem to know me so well."  
  
Gasping, she leaned to look at him. _Playing dirty, she realized. Should have known to expect no better from a Slytherin_. Reaching out, she curled her fingers in his hair, bending his head backward. At this angle, Snape's long, slender neck was suddenly exposed, as if begging her to bite on the lactic, delicate skin. Until - along with the sour-sweet tang of blood - she could taste his pulse on her tongue. It made him look vulnerable, and not a bit weaker for his vulnerability. _Lovely_ , she thought. _He is lovely_.  
  
Snape growled. "Out with it."  
  
She nodded. "Good. Now that you know your place, we can move along. Why me, you asked, and I'll tell you. Me- because I'm clingy. Because I'm vulnerable and brittle. Me, because I am so easily snapped. I remember everything you told me about your parents, the almost nothing you did tell- while demanding I tell you everything, not very egalitarian of you, wouldn't you agree? _Me_ , Snape, because I am so willing to be beaten: because I won't protect myself. Because I want another _Daddy_ ," she spat the words venomously, "and you want another Mummy. Can't you see? That's why we are suited so perfectly: our parents defected us exactly to fit each other. A match made in earth."  
  
To her surprise, he wasn't poisonous, nor was he furious, only weary and sad. Slowly, he reached to untangle her fingers from his hair, gently removing himself from her body and coming to lie beside her. "It might have been that way, once," he said after some thought. "I would hurt people because that was all I knew: because it granted me a sensation of momentary calmn. Momentary strength over my opponent. I'd feel secure in my power and my ability to inflict some emotion - whatever kind of emotion - where there was none before. It would somehow make me feel alive. Potent. It is false, Hermione," he said, the fatigue of years making his eyelids heavy and his voice husky. "Just like the sense of calmness the razor induces is false."  
  
She closed her eyes, feeling the tears burning the rim of her cognition, just on the point of becoming substance: almost touching the edge of the real world. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said what I said."  
  
"Think nothing of it."  
  
"No, no," Hermione shook her head, reaching to touch his face- the angular curve of his cheekbone, his lips, his chin. "I hurt you," she mumbled, attempting to stifle a sob. "I'm so sorry; I can be so stupid sometimes-"  
  
Snape, at her side, was looking into space, a lost child in a world of changing textures and interesting objects.  
  
At last, she simply gave up, retreating into the safety of the warm quilt and the gathering shadows underneath. No words were said between them when he joined her - a while later - under the covers, but she could feel his face pressing between her shoulder blades; a strong, sinewy arm coiling around her body, and she knew things were righted, at least for a while.  
  
At 5AM, stimulated into awakening by an inner sense of urgency - telling about things to be done and commitments to be fulfilled - she found him staring at her. Blinking away the last hazy mists of sleep she crawled out of bed, sneaking her legs into his slippers and wrapping herself in one of his flannel robes.  
  
"You should go back to sleep," she muttered, still drowsy before having washed her face and brushed her teeth. She had managed most forms of self grooming using magic when staying overnight in his rooms, but had recently been considering picking up several basic items at Hogsmeade, to be left in Snape's bedroom for her regular use. He would probably protest, but it was only logical for her to keep a toothbrush and a hairbrush in his bathroom. Magic might do the trick, but she needed the acidic tang of toothpaste in her mouth; the sharp scorch of the toothbrush's bristles against her teeth; the floss curving its way between her teeth to her gums, in order to feel clean.  
  
Lumbering to the bathroom, she washed her face, skillfully applying a _Scourgify_ , along with some of Snape's toothpaste - smeared on her teeth and gums to get rid of her night's breath - as a substitute for her toothbrush and floss. A _Scourgify_ was applied to Snape's hairbrush as well, before it was allowed to touch her mane.  
  
Snape, fully clothed, was standing beside the dead fireplace when she returned to the bedroom.  
  
"What is it with you?" she asked impatiently, reaching for her clothes which where neatly folded on a small armoire not far from the bed. "I apologized to you yesterday," she added, quickly clasping her bra and pulling her t-shirt over her head. "What do you want me to do? Crawl on my knees? Beg? Offer you sexual favo- _Fuck!_ " In her frenzy, she forgot she already inserted one foot into the worn-out denim, and leaping forward, had immediately tumbled and lost her balance.  
  
Swearing and cursing, Hermione was now fighting to regain her equilibrium. "Shit! Shit! Come and help me, you dolt- oh, the hell with it!" she cried at last, giving up and dropping to the floor.  
  
Breathing deeply, she felt a strange sensation of relief bubbling inside her; delicate ivy tendrils weaving around her heart, releasing small molecules of tension and somehow making it easier for oxygen to flow inside. It wasn't happiness, nor was it self-pity. Just relief, for the fact she was no longer fighting with the bloody garment. And at that, Hermione threw back her head, and laughed her heart out. "The hell with you, Snape," she called. "Tell me what it is you want or I can't help you."  
  
Lifting her eyes, she could see him still watching from his position at the fireplace. _He is like an ancient relic_ , the thought had struck her still bubbling self; _a piece of canvas torn from an old family portrait: my love is both the cold, forbidding father, and the estranged, lonely boy_.  
  
His face cleared from expression under her scrutiny. "We are going to the Circle."  
  
She nodded, sighing. "Sometimes I wish I could understand you."  
  
"It's the same for me."  
  
"I'm practically an open book," she said. "Either you would tamper with me to get whatever answers you're looking for."  
  
"Is this indignation I'm hearing?"  
  
She finally scrambled to her feet and pulled the jeans up properly. "What else would you expect to hear? You treat me like a child and I'm sick of being treated like a child."  
  
He tilted his head; the old, familiar gleam of devious amusement back in his eyes. "Yes, yes. But unfortunately, Hermione, you are a child - a teenager, if you'd like me to be accurate - and you behave as one. Sometimes I am amazed at how mature you are. Other times, I'd like to bend you over my knee and spank you."  
  
She rolled her eyes, allowing her bored, contemptuous expression to show Snape exactly what she thought of his latter idea.  
  
"Now is one of them," he added darkly.  
  
"Oh, really?"  
  
He turned to look at her, bringing his index finger under her chin and forcing her head up. "Tell me, apprentice, are you so short of words that you would react like a boorish teenager, screwing your face at me, swearing and cursing, when you are displeased with something I have told you?"  
  
She greeted her teeth. "If you weren't such a fucking-"  
  
"Language!" he roared.  
  
Sighing, she forced herself to calm down. "As I was trying to say, if you weren't such a tease, I would have never… I am never…" she wasn't sure what she sought to say, and her head swam from his nearness. "I am never like that with anybody else," she struggled for the right words. "You just rub me the wrong way."  
  
"That is hardly an excuse," he said quietly. "How can you ever expect to harness the power of the Circle when you can't even hold your own tongue?"  
  
Hermione nodded, her face flushed with shame. "You are right, of course. I will try harder. Are we going now?"  
  
"Yes. I'll lend you a warm cloak."  
  


* * *

  
  
Snow, white and gleaming, covered Hogwarts grounds, from the edge of the Forbidden Forest in the west - where bluish mists crept from the frost-encrusted trees - to the low, rounded hills on the east: like the fur cloak of Narnia's Queen, trapped in the bushy boughs of heather, and fallen to cover the earth.  
  
Two polar researchers, they were making their way in the mirage light of pre-dawn, treading in the ankle-deep snow. The Stones, lean and graceful, were observing them from afar; the rich blood of sunlight already pulsing over their ancient veins.  
  
Weary from hopping in the snow, Hermione made her way toward a bulky, fallen Stone - a sleeping mother bear, she always thought - and climbed to settle onto the curves of the hibernating animal. "Come," she tapped on the female bear's hip. "Join me.  
  
He shook his head, refusing her invitation. Sharp, frosty wind was disheveling his hair, reddening the tip of his long, hooked nose. Clad in his black winter cloak, arm-length locks of raven hair framing his face in a wild, gushing mass, he was like a pink stain on Sally and Conrad's Snow.  
  
"A penny for your thoughts?" she offered.  
  
Snape lifted his eyes to look at her. "You, Potter and Weasley. I know you are preparing yourself for whatever the end of this year may hold."  
  
She nodded. "You probably know more than I about the matter. Care to share some information?"  
  
To say he was less than enthusiastic to share whatever it was he knew about the subject with his young lover would have been an understatement. Nevertheless, for some reason, she noted he was attempting to cooperate. "I hardly know more than you do. The Dark Lord is impatient. He wants the Wizarding World at his feet, and he wants it now. This - and Potter dead, of course - he means to achieve with one fatal blow, sometime towards your graduation. But you hardly need a spy to tell you that."  
  
"You are still spying on him? Still going there?" she asked, angry that she had to force the air to pronounce the words up her throat, and that doing it felt like dissolving layers of soft tissue off her windpipe.  
  
Snape appeared amused at her sudden anger. "Why, Hermione, you make it sound as if I ever stopped."  
  
She clenched her fists, nails digging into soft flesh. "Don't screw with me, Snape-"  
  
" _Language_ ," he lashed at her. "Is that what 'I'll try harder' means in your lexicon, Miss Granger?"  
  
"I don't care!" she burst out. "You supercilious, pretentious, impossible bastard! I don't fucking care about my damn language! Not when your life is at risk! If something ever happens to you- if something ever happens to you-" she stuttered.  
  
"If something ever happens to me you can have my library," he completed sarcastically.  
  
Tears were stinging her eyes. "I don't care about your stupid library."  
  
He blinked. "I thought you loved my library."  
  
"I love you more."  
  
She wondered whether it could ever be different between them: heated arguments, replaced by fragments of crystalline silence. She wondered whether anything she could ever offer him would count as proper compensation for turning his sacred, crystal-clear solitude into this shattered-glass embodiment of what they had together. She wondered if he could ever love her, even one fourth of how she loved him, and knew it hardly mattered. If anything, longing was easy. The Hermit longed for knowledge; young Hermione longed for her father's approval. Adult Hermione could therefore long for her snow and ebony lover; she could long for him and impale herself on his cock, on the double-pointed stiletto that was his intellect; she could long for him and impale herself on the razor-sharp edge of his solitude. _I will be the human sacrifice on the center-piece of your Circle, and be I will be happy with it_ , she thought quietly, looking for his eyes, _but you must keep your end of the bargain and spare me a shred of your deific approval_.  
  
"Hermione," he began at last, face strained into an expression of anguish. _Poor St. Snape_ , she mused viciously, _fending off in-love, teenaged dragon_.  
  
"Oh, just shut up," she muttered, leaning to grab a fistful of snow and throwing it angrily in his general direction. "I don't need you to love me! I don't need you to care for me! I just need you to watch your own arse and come back alive." She stopped, panting, swallowing back her tears. "Then I can be the one to kill you. And now do us both a favour and tell me why you dragged us here when it's practically freezing, and what it has to do with me and my friends' training."  
  
Snape sighed, apparently relieved that no more declarations of love or dealing with such were in order. "You have already witnessed the power-shield the Stones create when activated," he said. "I taught you some of the things a wizard can do with the Stones when casting a circle among them. Some of the ways in which their power can be drawn, channeled and used. You also know they would enhance a wizard's power- when they are activated; when a wizard knows how to ask. The Stones are a form of wandless magic," Snape stated. "I trust it did occur to you, at least once or twice in the past. Am I correct, Hermione?"  
  
Frowning, she looked for his eyes in the aquatic dawn-light. "It had, once, or twice, or several times," she answered, irritated that he would assume such an obvious fact would escape her.  
  
Realizing where was it Snape had been attempting to lead her, Hermione went on; "I thought we might draw Voldemort into the Circle-" - she saw him flinch at the explicit name, but continued nonetheless - "draw him into the Circle, where you and I raise the Needfire. Make sure he is isolated from his Death Eaters, then let Harry finish the job."  
  
Snape, gathered in his warm winter cloak - like a child wrapped in a garment two times their size - angled an eyebrow. "How, exactly, would you do that?"  
  
She moistened her lips. "We still haven't figured that out. Ron claims the Killing Curse should finish him. Harry argues that there is not enough mortality in Voldemort for the Killing Curse to actually work."  
  
"And what do you say?"  
  
"That even the gorgon would fall to the ground once you cut off her neck."  
  
The Potions Master seemed pensive. "You're all looking for the answer in the wrong place," he determined, cool and detached as usual.  
  
Hermione tightened her lips. _How easily you would put off my notions. And not even with a pat on the cheek, telling me I did my best. You bastard_.  
  
"Are we?" she asked him, her voice dripping poisoned sugar. "Oh ye mighty Snape, you flowing fountain of wisdom, please, I beseech you, share thy knowledge with thy-"  
  
"Shut up," he hissed. "You foolish child. Now tell me, do you know what is behind the heavily warded door in the Department of Mystery?"  
  
She blinked. " _Love_."  
  
He nodded. "Good. And what is it Voldemort cannot stand?"  
  
"Love," she replied. _Or perhaps I should ask you, what is it Snape cannot stand?_  
  
"Tell me- can you perform wandless magic?"  
  
Her brow furrowed at the sudden change of subject. "Why do you ask?"  
  
"Wandless magic, as you might have realized if you paid more attention," he snapped, "is an unintrusive form of magic wherever things concern the Stones; it correlates the Stones' power: working _with_ the Stones, and not _against_ them. Can you see where I'm heading, or should I abandon every trace of subtlety on your behalf?"  
  
She jumped off the stone at once, so angry she thought her blood might shriek with it. "You," she told him, sticking her index finger in his chest, "are a first class prick. Don't you ever again tell me that the razor is false, or that hurting your opponents or the people who might try to reach for you, is false either. Don't you ever give me that bullshit if you can't prove me that you have outgrown pushing away everyone who might dare to love you."  
  
She was breathing heavily; smoky clouds of frozen breath curling in front of her eyes like the larva Nragileh's rings - and disappearing into thin air. The wind, harsh and biting, was disheveling her honey coloured locks, slapping them against her exposed face.  
  
Snape, less than a yard away, was looking at her with a strange hunger in his eyes. So close, yet unreachable. _Perhaps I need rocky shores to break onto_ , she mused. _Perhaps I'm but the salty, whispery foam of waves. But then, one can either romanticize Severus Snape, or wither of frustration_.  
  
Sighing, determined that she would not snap, not now, of all times, she raised her head to look at him. "Don't answer me," she said. "Just think very carefully about what I told you. And in the meanwhile, seeing how fond you are of Harry, I am very curious to find out how exactly did you conclude Harry's source of power is _love_?"  
  


* * *

  
  
Snape, intolerable bastard that he was, remained uncooperative for the rest of the time they spent in the circle. When, at some point, he asked her to show him what she knew of wandless magic, she was hurt enough to focus her power into a forceful blow that knocked him off his feet and sent him flying into the untouched snow.  
  
Cursing, he rose to his feet, daring her to show him some real magic, and not, as he put it, "a childish wizarding imitation of a fist fight."  
  
Even noticing her distinct ability to master this extremely complex form of sorcery, he offered no praise - no acknowledgment of her achievement. Not a word to indicate he was impressed at her ability to do wandless magic without ever being taught _how_ , without ever receiving proper guidance, at such a young age. Which stung. Immensely.  
  
Enraged, knowing she had to think quickly, Hermione launched a curse that would temporarily amplify the skin's reaction to chill; this, given current weather conditions, would cause her opponent immense damage.  
  
She was unsurprised to see Snape repelling the curse with a powerful _Protego_ \- _just like I was trying to teach Harry for ages_ \- then casting a spell of his own. Which she diverted with a counter curse.  
  
They dueled until he had enough: she was too stubborn and too much of a Gryffindor to admit she was no match for him. With Harry, who was stronger than both of them, she could compete, but only because he was as inexperienced as she. An hour later, dismissed, Hermione tumbled, exhausted, into the mother bear's lap. Her eyes shut as she rested her heated forehead against the cold, frosty Stone.  
  
Snape, whom she didn't notice approaching, seemed to stand right over her. "You did well," he uttered quietly.  
  
She snorted, turning to lie with her back against the Stone, so that the fresh, chilly sunlight could wash the sweat off her face.  
  
Meanwhile, Snape sat down beside her on the Stone, arms wrapped around his legs and chin rested on top of his knee caps. Many times before, watching him assume this position, she thought this is how the child Severus must have looked like: limbs drawn to his body, curled into a little ball of fatal silence, much like an embryo. As little as possible, so as not to be noticed: as little as possible of himself to be seen; as little as possible of himself to be hit and broken. Again, he was staring into space, at the Stones - almost milky white with the fresh new day - and behind them, on the misty horizon, where the last traces of the night were finally diminishing, dissolved by the sun's saline light.  
  
She tilted her head to look at him. "Tell me what it is."  
  
Snape frowned. Still, he would not look at her. "It's not- not-" a flicker of emotion wavered on his angular, fey face, and was gone almost as quickly as it came. It was wrenching to see him lost for words, and Hermione was suddenly selfishly afraid - that this man, this autistic child - might actually need her.  
  
"You are pushing too close, is all," he said at last. "I love my solitude. I need my solitude. I never pretended to be a perfect man- I am harsh and angry and if you offered me your tender feelings I would probably throw them back in your face for not knowing what else to do with them. And you are so damn young- younger even than your peers-" he shook his head. "I should be damned for merely wanting you, never mind touching you. And I am the last thing you need- your aging, sarcastic, brooding professor-"  
  
"You are everything I need!" she cut across his words, unwilling to take any more of this nonsense.  
  
He closed his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Will you, _for once_ , just shut up and listen?"  
  
"Will you stop being a git!" she cried.  
  
Snape turned to face her. With the low morning sun at his back and his disheveled mane framing his pale features in wild, untamed ropes, he looked like something out of time and place - the elf king reincarnated: the Morrigan in a male form. "You preposterous, presumptuous little child," he growled. "Either you think with your hormones, or you think with your heart, but hardly have you ever thought with your head. Can't you see this is _wrong_?"  
  
She wanted to slap him, but seeing the pain in his eyes, Hermione took a steadying breath, ignoring the sense of entrapment. "I-don't-care," she said as calmly as possible, foreclosing her lips around each syllable. "I love you, and I don't care if it's wrong."  
  
The iciness of the Stone lap at her back seemed to soak through the many layers of wool she had worn this morning, just like the consuming quality of his gaze was singeing cigarette-holes through her heart. "Oh, to the hell with it," she muttered. "And you, too!"  
  
Crying in frustration, she reached for the collar of his robe, pulling him onto her and fastening her lips to his mouth. At first it was cold, snowy and unyielding like the barren winter-land that surrounded them. Then his lips suddenly parted, mellow, tepid heat pouring into her mouth - sharp contrast to the violent kiss that spoke of ownership and dominance and mine, _mine- yes, yours…_  
  
Suddenly urgent, his fingers were unbuttoning her winter cloak, fumbling with the heavy cloth and fervently pushing it aside. The sharp bite of cold, claiming these areas the cloak had been covering, made her shiver. Prying into the cloth of her robe, he was pulling it upward, over her hips. Arching, she helped him roll it over her midriff. At that, she could feel his cold, roughened fingertips tagging the edge of her jumper. They were sending her into tremors of pleasure whenever a new patch of naked skin was touched and explored.  
  
She was trembling - whether it was from cold or excitement, Hermione could not say for sure. The world was white and grey around her, Snape's lips leaving a trail of quickly frosting warmth along her neck. Burying his face in her hair, he breathed deeply, then kissed his way back to Hermione's already swollen lips.  
  
Still kissing, a cold hand made its way under her jumper and t-shirt, rolling up her bra in order to cup a warm, rounded breast. She cried - her dry sob of pleasure muffled by his lips - thrusting her breast into his palm. _Perfect_ \- they were perfect together, the way her warm skin drank the electrifying cold of his fingers; the way his bitter lips melted against her mouth. Perfect was the way his pallor and raven-black hair fit her peach and honey complexion, and how they moved against and with each other when they were making love. Like now.  
  
"Cold…" she heard herself murmuring, reaching for her wand. "Not like this, turn us… yes-"  
  
His lips never leaving hers, he brought her to sit in his lap. Then to her annoyance, Snape has gently released her hold of her wand. "Wandless magic," he whispered, teasingly biting on her lower lip.  
  
"Oh, oh…!"Concentrating, she closed her eyes, making herself ignore the sensations washing through her body. "I can't- not while you…"  
  
"Try harder," he demanded; opening the fly of her jeans and sneaking his hand into her pants.  
  
She clenched her jaws, cursing the man for being able to think of such things even in the throes of passion. However, just when she seemed to find the power to cast a sphere of heat, a skilled finger flicked on her clitoris. Losing her concentration, she collapsed, wriggling with pleasure against Snape's chest.  
  
"That's it!" she cried, moving to take her wand and quickly casting warming spell. "Either you don't want us to fuck; or you want me to freeze around your cock."  
  
Rising to her feet, basking in the sudden sensation of heat, she kicked her jeans aside, and in seconds, was back in his lap, releasing his erection. Sliding down his legs, she leaned forward to give it a quick lick, from the pulsing vein at the base of the cock to the purplish, already dripping head, then took it in her hand, watching Snape gape as she squeezed it lightly. _Good_.  
  
Positioning herself over his hips, she placed the glistening head of her lover's cock at her opening, and slowly impaled herself on his erection. The slowness of the act was maddening, the way she could feel him stretching and filling her, then finally being sheathed inside her wet, slobbery heat.  
  
She was reminded of an old, Brazilian myth, of cocks rising from the ground for women to ride them; so different from the western pagan myths where the woman was the earth, the anchor, the provider. She thought that perhaps Snape was an anchor of sorts, which she could cling onto, while fucking: that his semen might consist of reviving qualities, just like ancient Mother Earth birth's fluids which became rivers in the European pagan myth.  
  
Closing her eyes, she coaxed Snape into the rhythm that pleased her best, thrusting onto him to a mindless beat. Then, with his hands playing their magic over her body, undulating around and over and with him, she threw back her head, and let her orgasm ignite. The pleasure that had so far been gathering in her lower abdomen was lit with one, beautiful thrust, and burnt from her clitoris and vagina to her womb, belly, pelvis, and perhaps even marrow and soul.  
  
Hermione could not tell.  
  


* * *

  
  
Back from the snow, knowing she was still expected for a training session with Harry and Ron, Hermione chose to delay her shower. Instead, she ran a quick cleansing charm over her body. Still, she thought lazily, it would not completely charm away Snape's scent. It probably meant the spell was no good and that she was still dirty, but then, having strengthened over the last few weeks, she could deal with a temporary sense of uncleanness. Not to mention that knowing exactly what body fluids were involved in the act and knowing their chemical breakdown had helped immensely.  
  
Snape might have laughed at her, but the reason she could swallow his cum - aside from wanting to - was knowing precisely what it consisted of. And knowing it was not vile. Knowing her own body, her own desire, was not vile, although she might have felt this way. And often enough, she did.  
  
Perhaps, she mused, putting on a new t-shirt and faded blue jeans, _his scent is simply a part of me now: like his cock, like his lips, like his hands on my breasts_.  
  
Approaching the mirror, Hermione arranged her hair into a neat plait, then turned to pay a hasty pat to Crookshanks. The ginger tom - angry to be scratched at the wrong place in the wrong time - bit her in exchange for her lousy endeavors.  
  
"Berk!"  
  
'Git,' the cat murmured in return, never bothering to open his yellowish eyes.  
  
She arrived at the Room of Requirement short time afterwards, surprised to have Ron already waiting for her inside.  
  
"Oy! Hermione!"  
  
Smiling, she quickly disposed of her cloak - useless now that she was inside a room where a well-fed fire was burning cheerfully in the fireplace. "Hello, Ron. Why isn't Harry with you?"  
  
Ron's shoulders slumped in a sure sign of defeat. "He and his mystery lady found some empty room to spend the night together. One of the deserted rooms in the Northern Tower or something. He won't tell me more than that, and I suppose I should be happy that he told me even this…"  
  
Moistening her lips, she approached Ron, who sat on a low pouf near the fireplace. "And you tried to talk him out of this?"  
  
"Yes, well," Ron said, rolling his eyes. "It's crystal clear this girl is doing him no good."  
  
Hermione frowned, sinking to the thick carpet at Ron's feet. "I think," she began slowly, "that perhaps there is more than Harry might tell us to this relationship."  
  
"What more can there be?" Ron cried out. "Just look at him, 'Mione! My best friend wasting away front of my eyes, do you want me to sit by and do nothing about it?"  
  
"This is his life," she sighed, wondering, for a moment, what Ron might say if he ever learned who his other friend is seeing. "Those are his choices. Attempting to interfere, you'll only push him away, and then there'll be nothing you can do, _at all_."  
  
Ron shook his head, running his hands through his wild red mane. "I can't. I can't sit on the sideline and watch him hurt himself."  
  
"Ron," she tried once again. "Sometimes the best thing we can do is be the good friends we are, and remain apart. You cannot prevent Harry from making the mistakes to which he is due. You can only help him once he realizes his mistake. And until then, take care you are still in a position to help him when he is in a condition to receive your help."  
  
He clenched his teeth. "It's so fucking hard, 'Mione. I don't know if I can."  
  
Hesitating, unsure of her actions, she reached her fingers to touch his hand: his strong, sun-scorched, freckled hand, which once knew her body so well. Fleetingly, almost as if she was afraid this simple act of friendly affection might singe her - or him, or both of them - Hermione covered Ron's hand with hers.  
  
She saw him giving her a quizzical look, remembering that physical displays of affection were a rarity for her. Excited or elated, she might rise to the soles of her feet and give him a quick peck on the cheek: hug him, even, when he came back to her after a long, nasty fight. Being Harry Potter's friend, she mused; one could never tell what would come up next. _No wonder he's looking whimsically at me. He remembers that when I touched him it would automatically mean sex_. Which was obviously not the case now. Nonetheless, Hermione didn't blame Ron for thinking so. Where it concerned her, occasionally touch was bestowed on a whim. Otherwise touch meant sex, and she would only willingly touch Snape, whom she was sleeping with. Whom she loved.  
  
However, she knew Ron needed this physical reassurance. She might not understand his need for haphazard physical contact, but nonetheless respected it, and was willing to offer some, knowing that she could. For her, though, things were different. People brushing against her in the hallways; the occasional pat on the shoulder; a friendly hug - would all make her shudder in repulsion, reminding her of another kind of touch she would rather not remember. All would summon the old sensations up to the surface of her skin: they would make her sick. They would make her _dirty_.  
  
She suppose the ability to enjoy this form of communication was lost on her: it simply didn't feel right. She didn't think it would ever feel right, with Harry; Ron, or with anyone else. That night, in Snape's arms, which was merely touch and not sex at all, might have kindled something similar to curiosity - similar to hope, inside her, but even so, she did not look to him for salvation. Grace, maybe, _for my lover is graceful in his own crude, harsh way_ , but not salvation.  
  
So yes, she reflected, full access to this certain kind of touch was denied from her, but nonetheless, Hermione knew she could give it.  
  
"If you love Harry," she said at last, pressing Ron's hand gently, "if you care for Harry, you ought to try."  
  
He nodded.  
  
Harry's arrival, a few minutes later, put an end to their conversation. Harry, Hermione noted, looked uncharacteristically tranquil; green eyes shimmering behind his ugly, ridiculous spectacles. The same perpetual love-bite was glowing from his neck.  
  
"Hello," he greeted them, "Hermione ….Ron. Good morning. So what is it you said we practice today, pet?" he turned to Hermione. "Protection shields? Triangular formations for repelling and casting?"  
  
She growled. "Call me 'pet' one more time Harry, and next time you make out, your mystery lover will have to look for your _little_ friend with a magnifying glass. Is that clear?"  
  
Harry paled at once. "Crystal."  
  
She smirked. "I'm glad to see you're catching on. And to your question: no, Harry, we won't be practicing protection shields today, nor will we be practicing triangular formations for repelling and casting. Today we are going to practice some wandless magic," she told him. "And later, perhaps, we'll be taking a short trip on Hogwarts' grounds."


	20. The Visit

_nothing is more exactly terrible than  
to be alone in the house, with somebody and  
with something)  
  
You are gone. there is laughter  
  
and despair impersonates a street  
  
i lean from the window, behold ghosts  
\--  
slightly i am hearing somebody  
coming up stairs, carefully  
(carefully climbing carpetedflight after  
carpeted flight. in stillness,climbing  
the carpeted stairs of terror)  
  
and continually i am seeing something  
  
inhaling gently a cigarette (in a mirror  
  
\-- excerpts from "nothing is more exactly terrible than"  
  
\-- e.e.cummings_  
  
  
  
Late one night the week before Christmas, as she sat on his bed, leafing through one of his antique Potions texts -- a book of lust potions, which interested her greatly and caused her to give him sidelong, half-smiling glances -- she let slip how she'd discovered that Snape and Minerva had owled her parents. He sat behind her, his chest snugly to her back, his legs around the outside of hers, toying idly with her hair and the ticklish places he had found, to make her skin shiver like that of Lucius' beautiful horse when it twitched away flies. In recent weeks she had given up sneaking into the potions dungeon, and crept into his quarters instead. He had given her the passwords for his wards days ago so that she would not be caught outside his door in the dim late-night corridor, tapping and calling for him, or worse, doing strong magic to break his wards; he knew she could do it, and likely Dumbledore would be alerted. It was murderously difficult, giving up his privacy like this. But there seemed to be no keeping her away, and truthfully, he didn't wish to. He had gone so far as to tell the house elves to stay out of his rooms entirely, not to enter them for _any_ reason, not even to clean, unless he called them.  
  
"Here, this one," she said now, running her index finger down the list of ingredients. "We have everything we need to brew it. We wouldn't even have to go to Knockturn Alley to fetch something obscure. Hagrid will have the hippogriff tail hairs."  
  
"Hmm," he said, nuzzling beneath her ear. It was just there, behind her lobe, that she was both most ticklish and most fragrant. "What potion is that."  
  
"It would make electricity come from our hands. Imagine the sensation." She caught the back of his head and pulled his face around, turning to slide her tongue between his lips.  
  
He spoke against her mouth, but he knew she could feel his erection stirring against her back, pressing between them most unsubtly. "Rather like being crawled over by hundreds of insects. No, thank you. Besides, it would be difficult to explain to your parents why their daughter is drugging herself to have electric sex with her professor."  
  
"You could simply owl them, as you did last time." She bit his lower lip in punishment, not very gently. Even so, Snape did not sense any change in the tension in her body; she was still relaxed.  
  
"What last time?" He set the book away and turned her to face him, to deepen the kiss into something hotter, more erotic. Her yoga made her flexible...she was able, grinning, to lift her leg over and past his head as he turned her, and settle her moist heat against him with a wicked nestling wriggle, linking her ankles behind him. "Merlin, Hermione." His thumbs brushed over her nipples and she arched forward.  
  
"Before...you know. That time in your office, with the scalpel." She reached between them, and in only moments he was sheathed in her, and she was helping him rock the two of them, in excruciating slowness.  
  
"So they told you we'd owled?"  
  
"They owled me back, plans for Christmas...plans for therapy...Snape, stop talking...move like...like this."  
  
"I -- Hermione, I can't move quite -- how you want me to move --"  
  
"You could if you would do yoga with me in the mornings." With a small smile, she took pity on him and allowed him to lie back on his bed. This time, she did the hard work. For a while he forgot what she'd let slip, groaning beneath her, shuddering to his climax more than once that evening as her interior muscles clenched him fiercely.  
  
Snape did not forget for long, though. Two days later, still several days before Christmas Eve, he slipped off to Hermione's private Head Girl's room. He did it when he knew she was in the Room of Requirement with Harry, also remaining at Hogwarts over the winter break, practicing obscure magic and formations in some pointless attempt to be prepared for Voldemort. As if anyone could be prepared for that monster, though if any pair had a chance, it was that one. He carefully brought down her wards, noting them so that he could replace them.  
  
Once inside, he looked around. On her bed, that vile Kneazle, Crookshanks, arched at him and spat. Snape pointed his wand at the cat, who skittered under the bed and glared at him balefully. Apparently the Kneazle knew about wands and the dangers they represented. Everything was fanatically neat in her room; she kept it much the way he kept his quarters; spare, tidy, with very few items out on the flat surfaces of the desk or night tables. Her small bookshelf was filled to bursting, however, and he went towards it. He hoped the letter was not stashed inside of one of her many books. He glanced at a few of the titles and realized she was very well read. Both Muggle and wizard literature and scientific works were much in evidence, as well as a few lurid paperback mysteries, horror novels, and other popular fiction, including what looked like romances, with idealized cover paintings of heroic men and women in various stages of undress. _Is this where you find your ideas about sex, is this where you learned how to make love? Perhaps I should borrow one or two and see for myself._  
  
_If I were a young woman --oh, Snape! so very young -- where would I keep a letter from my hated parents? Or would I have destroyed it?_ There were not many secret places in the room, as far as he could see. He crossed to her work desk and peered inside her spare cauldron: squeaky clean, but empty. He began opening desk drawers, not sure what to look for. Eventually it occurred to him to try summoning the letter. He shook his head at his own stupidity. " _Accio_ letter from Hermione's parents."  
  
And of course it did the trick. There was a brushing sound from one of the desk drawers, and a plain folder slithered out. Snape caught it before it could open and spill its contents. And there, inside, was a pristine envelope among other, more worn and well-read papers, parchments and letters, with a smiling tooth high in one corner, and careful, looping script addressed to Hermione. He opened it, briefly checking the date and some of the content. _Yes. This is what I seek. Details of Christmas plans, now moot._ He tucked the letter into the pocket of his robes, and returned the folder to the desk drawer. Snape left the room, restoring her wards.  
  
Now, to go someplace she would not find him, and read the letter in absolute privacy for a change. Momentarily, tucked into a small supply room near the Transfiguration class, Snape lit his wand and leaned his back against the door.  
  
**"Dearest Daughter,  
  
"Your father and I were extremely concerned to be informed that you are having difficulties coping with the stresses of your final year at Hogwarts. According to what Professors McGonagall and Snape have written us, there has been a recurrence of the symptoms you experienced when you were eight.**  
  
_All right, so far_ , thought Snape, _but your daughter has a name. It's Hermione. And Merlin, this...uncleanness...has happened before. Merlin. Eight years old. Oh, Hermione._  
  
**"My disappointment at hearing this from your Professors would hardly come as a surprise to you, and I would express my wish, again, that you would have come to me with your problems, seeking for solace and advice. I might not be in a position to fully understand what you are experiencing, but I am still your mother, and I want to see you happy. With your welfare in mind, I have contacted a therapist who comes highly recommended by Emily Drummond. Her name is Imogene Severn and she is at the top of her profession. You may remember Emily's son Nigel, who experienced something similar to your problem. Dr. Severn helped him through and past his issues, and I am sure she can help you, since she specializes in teenagers. She has agreed to meet you over the winter break, in several intensive sessions, two sessions per week.**  
  
_Good, I see that you wish to help your daughter. A point or two to you, loving mother that you must be, but it won't make up for the years of not guarding my Gryffindor closely enough._  
  
**"We must see to this problem at once; nothing must taint your good grades thus far. We still expect you to pass your Salamanders later this year with flying colors. Therefore when you come home, your father and I will be waiting to help you. Your father is clearing his calendar of patients for the few days before and after Christmas so that he can be with you during this difficult time. I will continue running the clinic. We will of course forego our skiing holiday in the Alps, should that prove necessary.**  
  
_Salamanders. Imagine. Muggle dentists, never bothering to listen, to understand what their daughter is doing here at school, yet still requiring her to do well. And daddy, clearing his calendar, while mummy is away._ Snape scowled deeply at the letter in his hands. _Daddy, wanting to be alone with his darling daughter. Over my corpse, perhaps, but not before. What does this Severn woman have planned for my pet? For surely I know what Daddy has planned -- the very same things I have planned_. Snape closed his eyes briefly. He was no better than her father, except for that little detail, the one that kept stunning him, sneaking up from the back of his brain in unguarded moments to prod him in a vulnerable spot: Hermione had in some way chosen him for her own. _Yes; and perhaps I you, as well. To your detriment, I fear_.  
  
**"Darling, don't let this little set-back affect your grades. We have high expectations of you, which I know you share. I'm certain if you simply spend more time studying and less time worrying about yourself, you will be better soon.**  
  
_A little set back. Study harder. Put more pressure on yourself. Hermione, have you never told them about Harry, about Voldemort?_  
  
**"We are well here, and the clinic is doing nicely, as always. We will be at the station to collect you in a few weeks. "**  
  
It was signed, " **With affection, Mummy and Dad** " in that same precise, curling script. Affection, but no love, no well wishes, no expression of a desire to come and see their daughter before break. In Snape's prior experiences with students, normal parents came running when a letter from Hogwarts arrived expressing concern. Instead, (his eyes scanned the clinic letterhead, looking for names...ah, yes) _Donna and Lester_ send their daughter an owl, demanding she work harder, instead of contacting the school for more information. A growl bubbled up from his throat. He folded the letter back into its envelope and stuffed it into a pocket of his robes.  
  
Still...impressions were at odds in his brain. Clearly Donna loved her daughter. But equally clearly Hermione feared or hated or dreaded her parents. He must somehow convince Minerva it was necessary to visit the Grangers, and find a way to tag along with her. He must see for himself what went on in that perfect house, reconcile the two stories in his mind.  
  
He thought back to the story he and Hermione had devised to allow her to remain at Hogwarts over Christmas. Hermione had explained to her Head of House and her friends that Donna and Lester had unexpectedly been called away. Snape and Hermione had owled the Grangers to explain that the symptoms seemed to be lessening without treatment (this was true, but Snape knew it was the escalation of his relationship with Hermione that was responsible for the apparent healing). Hermione expressed her wish to stay at Hogwarts over the holidays to study more intensively without the distraction of classes and Head Girl responsibilities.  
  
It did not bother Snape in the least to lie bald-faced to the Grangers.  
  
Lying to Minerva, however, was another thing altogether. Next to Angharad, Minerva was the person Snape respected most on his short list of...friends. Yes, he supposed Minerva was his friend. He had so few that up until now he could number them on one hand. Angharad, Lily (at one point), Minerva. Flitwick, to a lesser extent; the Charms professor tolerated Snape well, conversed with him often, and was his occasional ally in pranks against Minerva. Lucius, in some strange and long-ago way. Snape did not count Dumbledore; though he respected the Headmaster of Hogwarts, he was not fond of the devious old man, no matter how well-intentioned he was. His machinations were distressing to Snape personally, and appeared now to be endangering students.  
  
And now, his sixth friend (and lover), Hermione, beginning a new hand for his counting. Something inside him broke a little. At all costs, she must not be hurt anymore.  
  
_I thought you loved my library._ He had meant it sarcastically, that dawn in the snow, to make a point.  
  
_Hermione: "I love you more."_ She had spiked his guns with those simple words; he'd had nothing else to say, and was not able to keep his feelings out of his face. Thankfully she had let him off the hook, moving on to other topics, the war, killing Voldemort. Harry and love. _Lily's boy...and Lucius' boy. How very, very dangerous for Potter._  
  
The tremendous power of her words. That power shook him all the way from his hooked nose to his long, pale feet, lingering longest in his gut and heart, doing damage there, damage he would never be able to repair. She had crept beneath his skin weeks ago; now, she was dwelling in one chamber of his heart, obstructing his blood flow, yet becoming his oxygen.  
  
He pinched his nose hard between thumb and forefinger, closing his eyes for a moment or two, before he left the supply room and headed for Minerva's office.  
  
Minerva was tidying her desk, now that there were no papers to grade. Several brightly wrapped packages and wizard crackers were scattered on a work table near the windows. "Severus! How nice to see you. How are your Christmas preparations coming along?"  
  
"You know I do not celebrate," he growled at her, lounging in his preferred chair.  
  
"Yet you always manage to find a small token for me, and for Flitwick." She smiled down at her desk, putting away papers.  
  
"Obligations, trifles, nothing more," he mumbled. "Minerva."  
  
She looked up, her hands stilling at his serious tone. "What is it, Severus?"  
  
"I...find I must speak to you yet again regarding Miss Granger."  
  
Minerva sat forward. "But her hands look better," she said. "And she could not go home for the winter break because her parents would be called away during the time Hermione would be home, and it would not be good for her to be there alone --"  
  
"I know about all that," he said. "Minerva." He simply could not get it out.  
  
"You're alarming me," she said quickly.  
  
"Yes, I can see that. All right. Out with it, then. Minerva, something is wrong between Herm-- Miss Granger and her parents. Something, I think, that has to do with what's wrong with her hands, all the stress."  
  
"Whatever do you mean? Do you think her parents are the cause of her problems?"  
  
"Actually, I rather think I do. Or at least, Miss Granger perceives them that way."  
  
Minerva sat back, looking at him, assessing him. "Well. And just how, cruel and unfair Slytherin Professor Snape, did you obtain such very personal information about Hogwarts' Gryffindor Head Girl, and I did not?"  
  
His lips thinned. Minerva was too astute. _Tread carefully, Snape._ "Did I not tell you I've been giving her extra tutoring? She seemed to feel she needed additional training." Cautiously, he told the truth, but not all of it. Not what _kind_ of training he had given Hermione.  
  
"And so you have set her additional tasks, but that does not explain how you came to hear such personal information. Did you overhear her talking to Harry, or Ron?"  
  
It would be easy to say "Yes" to that question, but it would be lying, and he was in her presence now, and did not think he could lie to her successfully. "I hate to admit this," he said, "because if word got about it would be my ruin." _Indeed, Snape._ "But she makes a very able assistant, and we have become...friends...of a sort. We have shared...confidences." _And a bed. And a breakdown._  
  
"Dear me," said Minerva, blinking. This was definitely a shock to her. Snape had never before befriended a student, much less a Gryffindor. "And she told you all that."  
  
"No. Over the weeks, she has mentioned a few things, and I have put them together, but here is the thing: I'm not sure I'm right. But if I am, Miss Granger should not go home again until the situation can be resolved."  
  
"I can see you have a plan already. Tell me what you want to do about this, Severus."  
  
"I want us to go to the Grangers, Minerva. You, and I. I want us to assess the situation."  
  
"Just...apparate there, march in, and demand to know how they've been ill-treating their daughter?"  
  
_Yes_. "No, of course not. An interview, of sorts. That's why I need you to come along. You're her Head of House."  
  
"And your role in this interview would be...?"  
  
"Interested observer." _One who can use Legilimens effectively, subtly, carefully_.  
  
Minerva folded her hands on her desk and looked at him a long, long time. Snape began to fidget. "I...cannot say no," she finally said. "You've never asked me for anything like this before, so I can't discount your instincts, but oh, Severus. You're asking me to lie to Hermione's parents."  
  
"Not at all. If there is lying to be done, I will do it. I am the Slytherin, not you." His lips parted in an unholy smile that made her wince. "I merely want you to be my entree to their home, and be your charming self. Let me do the prowling. But, we must go soon, before they leave for the Continent."  
  


~*~

  
  
Two days later, Snape and Minerva Floo'd to a Ministry of Magic branch office in Kent, and then took a Muggle cab to the Grangers' house. Never having been there before, it was not possible to apparate. They were expected, having owled earlier. Snape had not told Hermione he was going to see her parents; she would not like it when she found out, and this time _he_ would tell her. The results of her finding out on her own last time had been disastrous.  
  
The Grangers' house was lovely, a white cottage with balanced windows and blue drapery shining out into the winter sunlight. Late-season heather bushes bloomed next to the porch, pale pinkish purple against the white paint and the whiter snow. Snape's lip curled at its staid, suburban Muggle beauty. What stain did such perfection hide within its walls? _You could at least **try** to remain unbiased, Snape_, he chided himself. Christmas garlands twined their way along the porch railings, and a wreath of holly and ivy and red ribbon adorned the front door.  
  
Donna answered their knock, and welcomed Snape and Minerva graciously, eyeing their strange appearances askance, but still hospitably ushering them into the parlor. Snape found Hermione's large brown eyes in Donna's face, and the wings of her eyebrows. There too was Hermione's delicacy of face, though not the rest of Donna's features, and not her hair. The woman was perfectly groomed, dressed in a lovely tweed suit that, unlike Minerva's rumpled and comfortable skirts, had probably never seen a wrinkle. The wood floor of the entryway was so polished that Snape could see a dim, white gleam, the reflection of his face, as he looked down.  
  
And then, in the parlor -- Hermione's father. Lester rose from his leather armchair, striding to shake hands with the Hogwarts professors. Snape felt his grip, strong, warm, sincere. There was nothing harmful to read in the man's handsome appearance, and everything about him spoke of confidence, security, and intelligence. The man had at least five years on Snape, probably more. He was trim, strong, and still handsome, physically more impressive than Snape would ever be. His hair was greying slightly, in a distinguished manner, the silvering sprinkled evenly through the chestnut. In Lester's strong and well-cut waves, Snape could clearly see where Hermione got her bushy hair, though its color was a palette mixed of Donna's and Lester's.  
  
Donna rustled about the parlor, seating their guests and offering tea, which Minerva and Snape accepted. Minerva sipped at hers; Snape allowed his to sit and grow cold. There was no lemon on the tea tray, and he felt ill at ease.  
  
Donna was the first to speak. "We're so glad you came, Lester and I. It's good to see that there's such concern for our daughter's welfare."  
  
"Indeed," agreed Lester, his voice deep and educated. "I've long wanted to meet some of my daughter's teachers. We've only met a few in the wizarding world; the Weasleys, of course, and some of the folk in Diagon Alley, each year when we take Hermione for school supplies."  
  
Donna settled tidily on a leather hassock near Lester. She nodded to Minerva. "You must be Professor McGonagall, Hermione's Head of House."  
  
"Yes." Minerva sipped again. "And this is Professor Snape."  
  
"What subject do you teach?" asked Lester, with great interest. "We know Professor McGonagall teaches Transfigurations."  
  
"Your daughter is my Advanced Potions student."  
  
Lester's eyes lit up. "Potions! So you're the Potions Master Hermione has told us so much about."  
  
That caught Snape's attention. "Really?" _What does my lover tell her parents about the evil Slytherin Potions Master?_  
  
"Do tell," said Minerva, glancing at Snape.  
  
"Well, frankly -- it was all very complimentary. You're brilliant, she says, quite the researcher, very strict, high standards for your students, difficult topics, very challenging. How is my daughter doing in your class?"  
  
"Miss Granger has been at the top of my class since she came to Hogwarts."  
  
Lester looked proud. "That's my girl," he said.  
  
Donna folded her hands. "But you're not here to tell us how well our daughter is doing, are you."  
  
While Minerva began to broach the subject of Hermione's present difficulties, Snape sat back against the sofa to take himself further from the conversation at hand and let Minerva take that lead, so he could start focusing on Legilimency. Donna seemed the more transparent of the two, with her clear eyes, careful coif, and bright lipstick. Her hands were perfectly manicured, pale, clean, and whole. Not Hermione's hands at all. But as Donna turned her head to one side, Snape saw Hermione again in the shape of her ears, small, neat and pink. Her parents had been stirred together into the fine cocktail that was Hermione. He slowly began establishing a tentative connection via a very quiet _Legilimens,_ with Donna.  
  
"Well, Professor Snape brought the issue to my attention last month. Frankly, I'm embarrassed to say that I thought Hermione's hands were raw because she's working on intense and caustic potions. But I should have known Professor Snape would have taught her to be more careful than that."  
  
In Donna's mind, he found images of Hermione as a little girl, bright, cheerful, charming, a doll. There was affection, concern, and anxiety that Hermione's condition would reflect unfavorably upon Donna in some way. As though Donna were living through her child, and Snape and Minerva were finding fault with her because her daughter was unstable. Nothing unexpected, given what Snape had read in her letter to Hermione. The only odd thing he noticed was that Lester was not prominent in Donna's thoughts, except as an adornment, a figurehead. He found images of handsome Lester at parties, at social events, but little affection. Primarily Snape saw impressions of herself, and her daughter, and concern for her child. Only a sense of "I" and "my daughter" and never "we." He withdrew gently and set his teacup and saucer on the small table beside him.  
  
"Something more is wrong with Hermione than a simple skin reaction, and from your letter to her we gathered that this has occurred before." Minerva knew this much from Snape's briefing in the cab on the way to the Grangers'.  
  
Donna flushed. "Well, yes -- it has." Her hands twisted in her lap and she looked at Lester, as if for guidance. Lester said nothing, and Snape shifted his attention to the man.  
  
"Please tell us more," Minerva prompted. "That is, if you feel you can, without violating Hermione's privacy."  
  
_Oh, well played, Minerva. Yes, now you_ , Snape thought, looking at Lester, reluctantly feeling a grudging respect for the man, instead of disgust. Lester's conversation was intelligent and well presented. His brain seemed as crystalline as Lucius'; Snape found himself wondering if Hermione's father would have been sorted into Slytherin, a jewel like the Malfoys, had he been a wizard. Or perhaps a Ravenclaw, frighteningly bright and orderly. Lester's hands, as Minerva spoke, first lay calmly in his lap. As the conversation deepened and drifted into the area Snape most needed it to go -- Hermione's relationship with her parents -- Lester's hands crept out to clutch his knees. And there, in those very masculine fingers, Snape found Hermione's hands, in a much larger, harsher version. Lester's hands were very capable looking, strong, rather square, with large thumbs and broad palms.  
  
_Legilimens_ was not as easy as it had been with Donna; Lester was on his guard, waiting to hear what Minerva had to say about his daughter. Eventually Snape found a way in, watching as Lester gave his head a small shake and looked at Snape, who met his gaze calmly, blinking not at all. Lester smiled gently.  
  
Donna spoke. "Well...it was all very strange, we never got to the root cause, I believe, but after some treatment it just seemed to...stop."  
  
Minerva frowned slightly. "We've been wondering, Professor Snape and I, if Hermione's been getting along with the two of you lately? We understand these teenage years can be very rough, and the seventh year at Hogwarts is a demanding one. With Hermione being almost a year younger than most of her classmates, she might be feeling pressure..." Minerva's blather was soothing to the Grangers, and yet probed well for Snape and his Legilimency, leading Lester's mind to memories of times past, events, pressures, problems.  
  
"What about her boyfriend...Ron, is it?" asked Donna carefully.  
  
Yes! thought Snape. _Yes, go there, Donna_. A slow burn began to bubble in Lester, and Snape rode that rising tension, seeking a downward slope into a memory.  
  
"Well, you may or may not know...that relationship appears to have ended. Hermione broke it off, but it seems to have restored them to some sort of equal footing. We felt it was a positive thing. But the problems with her hands and arms have continued past that." Minerva finished her tea and set the empty cup aside. Donna immediately refilled the cup, looking at Snape questioningly, who shook his head.  
  
Lester was patently relieved that Hermione and Ron were no longer seeing each other. Snape caught just the fringe of a memory brushing by, a puppy-soft and young Hermione creeping into Lester's lap, arms about his neck, his strong arms about her, settling her close. _Love there. Love, yes, and...the lurking beginnings of something more. Some longing, some loneliness. Some lack of...was it Donna, that Lester lacked? Perhaps_.  
  
Lester spoke. "Were they sleeping together? That might have brought about this most recent outbreak." _Ah, jealousy. Just like mine...I recognize that troubling emotion._ Snape's hands clenched in his lap and he covered one with the other to calm himself. He fought hard to keep his lip from curling in revulsion.  
  
Minerva colored. "Well, I don't know the answer to that question, Mr. Granger --"  
  
Donna interjected. "If they were, I know Hermione was being careful. She mentioned she was already using contraception. I've told you this before, dear."  
  
Lester blinked at his wife, and looked at Snape. "And what have you to offer, sir?"  
  
"I am not privy to the details of Miss Granger's former love life," he said carefully. Minerva slid him a sharp glance. Lester's attention shifted to Minerva. Snape refocused his efforts, beginning a more active search through memories instead of just tasting those that the conversation surfaced.  
  
"If not her professor, nor her Head of House, then who would be privy?" demanded Lester. "Who is watching the children there at that school? Who is protecting my daughter from the predations of young men who --" He broke off, and suddenly Snape had what he needed: a wave, a virtual flood of memories.  
  
Lester, taking his daughter by the hand to the candy shop, to share smiles. Donna, turning away from Lester, absorbed in dressing her child as a miniature adult, in stockings and tight shoes. Lester, helping his small daughter with her shoes, tying the laces, sliding a hand farther than necessary up a childishly round leg, beneath the edge of a pleated plaid skirt, and squeezing the tenderness there. Lester, sucking a smear of chocolate from a small carbon-copy of his own square hand. Donna, choosing a separate bedroom, needing her rest. Lester, his sweet girl in his lap, a nail from one of those large thumbs rasping across a girlish nipple beneath a tricot shirt. Donna, uninterested in talking over a research paper, absorbed in her child's therapy. Hermione, joyfully sharing her Hogwarts letter at age ten, swung happily in circles by her father. Lester, with Hermione perhaps twelve or thirteen, breasts budding sweetly, sobbing in his lap dressed in summer shorts and sleeveless shirt, her forearms bandaged, and Lester kissing her sweaty neck, rocking her, soothing her. Hermione, showing her father her schoolbooks, wishing she could show him her magic over the summers, sharing her knowledge of her new world. Donna, her back to him, her entire world her child and the dental clinic. Hermione, listening to Lester's music and discussing it with him. And finally, Lester, creeping into a darkened room, sitting on the edge of a narrow bed, pushing curling hair back from a face flushed with sleep, wishing he dared do more than just look and sometimes touch. Longing for comfort, for an intellectual equal, for assurance. And love, always, _always_ , love. Overwhelming and huge, and confused.  
  
Snape rose and left the room abruptly. _Legilimens_ was ended.  
  
Minerva strove for calmness. "You'll have to excuse him," he heard her say as he left the room. "Travel disagrees with him."  
  
Outside the Grangers' lovely house, Snape vomited what was left of his breakfast into their well-kept flower bed, splattering the winter heather. He walked to the end of the drive and stood waiting for Minerva. He could not go back inside.  
  
When, eventually, Minerva emerged, Snape said nothing. He could not speak. He wrapped his arms around her and apparated them both to Diagon Alley. From here they could easily return to Hogwarts by Floo, but Minerva stayed him as he reached for the doorknob of the Leaky Cauldron.  
  
"Snape."  
  
He stared at his feet.  
  
"Did you get your information? Did you get what you went there for?"  
  
"That, and too much more."  
  
"Meaning...?"  
  
"Hermione's parents love her, very much."  
  
"I could have told you that."  
  
"But they are not healthy for her, either. The mother is distant and cold and self-involved, defining herself by how her child is perceived. The father...well, there are issues that concern me there. I don't want to speak more of it. Let it suffice that the right choice was made in allowing Hermione to remain at Hogwarts this holiday."  
  
Minerva stared at him, as he looked at the ground. He could tell she was waiting for him to say more; he knew there was much more she wanted to ask, but would not. Not just now, at any rate. Finally she said, "You can make your own way back, can't you? I want to do some Christmas shopping before I leave."  
  
"I'll be fine alone," he said.  
  
"Yes," said Minerva. "You always are." And she left him, vanishing in the holiday throng of the alley.  
  
Snape leaned against the wall of the Leaky Cauldron, trying to recover. It seemed his worst moments revolved around the front door of this damnable pub. Finally rousing himself, he decided he should find a few gifts as well. Perhaps thinking about the holiday would push the Grangers out of his mind, for a while. Something feminine and frivolous for Minerva, a new swizzle stick for Flitwick's odd little collection (the Charms professor could make almost anything work as a wand, though he did no wandless magic), and something for his apprentice. She needed her own sickle, and a netsuke to trap it in her rope belt, no matter what she thought of his goddess and his god. Though, Merlin knew, after he confessed to her where he'd been today, she would walk out of his life for good, and his gifts might go ungiven.  
  


~*~

  
  
That evening, when Hermione let herself into his quarters and took his book away so that she could sit in his lap, Snape stood abruptly and pushed her aside.  
  
"No." He moved to stare into the fireplace, where he had tossed some crystals of copper compounds to make the flames burn blue. "Hermione, I have something to tell you. You won't like it, and I won't mind if you're angry."  
  
She sat down, hard, on the arm of the chair he had just vacated. "What? Snape, what?"  
  
He turned to face her; he owed her that much. "I went to see your parents today. I forced Minerva to go with me."  
  
There was a long moment of frozen calm, then the eruption. "You _fucking did what?_ " She was up off the chair in an instant, her wand out, pointing at him.  
  
" _Protego_ ," he said, drawing his own wand. "Strike me, kick me, if you wish, but I will not let you use your wand against me."  
  
"You'd like me to hit you, wouldn't you? It would make you feel real again. Make you normal, make you bleed. Make you _feel something._ You _**bastard**_."  
  
He put his hand in his pocket and took out the letter, and held it out to her. When she saw what it was, she snatched it away and threw it into the heart of the fire, where it blazed red and orange and gold.  
  
"I went into your room, and I took that letter. I read it."  
  
Hermione stalked away; he could see her arms wrapping tightly around herself; she was trembling, and he didn't know whether it was with grief, or fury, or fear. "And so?" she said.  
  
"I was confused by what I read. Your mother's letter...it was...stilted, a little cold, but loving."  
  
"My mother loves me. Don't you speak to me about my mother, Snape, you lying Slytherin prick."  
  
"She loves you, yes, so it seems." He moved towards her slowly. "Yet I know what I saw, that day in my office, that day with the scalpel. I know what I heard, what you think."  
  
"Touch me and I promise you'll be wearing your cock around your neck! Remember, I don't threaten."  
  
Snape stopped, only feet from her. "Hermione, I had to know their truth, as well as your truth, to be able to help you."  
  
She spun. "And what was their truth, Snape? Is it the same as your truth, Hermione is a basket case, a fool, a paranoid maniac, a liar?" Her rage was truly astonishing. And so was her clarity. She was completely in control.  
  
"Their truth...," he said, hesitating. "They do love you. But they don't know what to do about you, they are like poultry raising an ermine hatched from a phoenix egg, something swift and beautifully feral and deadly to their kind in their midst. And your father -- your father --" he stopped, unable to continue. His hands began to lift towards her. She struck them away brutally. Now her eyes filled with tears.  
  
"My father loves me! I love my father!" The control slipped, but only for a moment.  
  
"Yes, he loves you. Yet he touches you like I do, like a lover would. He needs your mind, he _longs for it_ , as I need it and long for it. He wants you for himself, and yet he gave you this, he gave you Hogwarts and a life as a witch." He lifted his hands again, but now he did not look at her, he looked at his hands. "I saw what he wanted, there in his mind. I saw what he did. I saw what...what..." he had to pause to swallow; his gorge was rising again. "I saw what he took from you. Not your virginity, but certainly your innocence." He hissed the last words and walked into the bathroom, slamming the door behind himself, and vomited for the second time that day. _I am no better than Lester_ , was the only thought in his head.  
  
_Angharad: "Severus, the truth this time. Why did you begin to curse your father, there in the Circle?"  
  
"Because I hate him for what he did. What he was doing when I saw him in your mirror. What he has always done." Severus was again kneeling at her feet. He wanted to put his head in her lap. There was comfort there, comfort that he had rarely known, even as a child. Only on those rare occasions that his father left Severus and his mother alone in the house. Sweet, milky tea, and lovely biscuits, and games, and her soft arms around him, and kisses on his forehead.  
  
"And you think cursing him will make you whole?"  
  
"It will bring me peace."  
  
"It will bring you nothing."  
  
"It will avenge my mother. It will free her."  
  
"I say again, Severus, it will bring you nothing lasting. It is false."  
  
Now he did put his head in her lap, and wrapped his arms around her lower legs. "I cannot forgive him, Angharad."  
  
"I did not say you could, I only said you must. There is a difference." Her hands, warm, strong, gnarled, rested on his head.  
  
" **Must** implies **could**."  
  
"It does not. My apprentice, when you let go of that hatred, you will forgive. What he did to you was terrible, damnable, but it is not for you to punish him."  
  
"I will hate him always."  
  
"Then you will hurt others always. Until that ghost is gone from your soul, you will hurt others."  
  
"Then I will simply be alone."  
  
"You will not. Someday there will come one that you do not wish to hurt. And when that time comes you will find that must **must** equal could, or you will lose that one as well. _"  
  
That time was now, Snape feared. He stared at himself in the mirror over the sink, gripping the porcelain hard, and stooped to rinse his mouth. He had wanted her to strike him, to fight with him, to beat him for his actions. To hurt him, because he was hurting her.  
  
There was a knock on the bathroom door. Snape turned to look, and as he turned, the door opened.  
  
"You've been sick," Hermione said bluntly, indicating the mess in the basin. Snape turned the water on with more force to rinse the mess away.  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Because I make you sick?" She still looked angry, he saw.  
  
"Because of what I saw, because of what I did, because of the hurt I have caused you." Snape could see she had never expected to hear that from him; she stared, her mouth slowly gaping open, blinking. She bit her lips and turned her face away from him, leaning hard against the lintel of the bathroom door, but she didn't leave the room. "I know you love your parents. I don't understand how that can be. I don't love my own parents."  
  
"You loved your mother."  
  
"My mother was weak."  
  
"Your mother didn't save you from him, that's all. Well, neither did mine. What does that make the two of us? Twins? Lovers? Strangers?" Her laughter was bitter. She moved to stand behind him, close against him, her hands over the tops of his as they clenched on the sides of the basin. "Look at us. Just look." She peered into the mirror with him, her face protruding from behind him, somewhere between his elbow and his shoulder; she was so slight when compared to his tall, thin frame. Their eyes met in the mirror.  
  
"Leave me be, Hermione," he said. "I am not fit. I am no better than your father. I want what he wanted."  
  
"I will not leave you be," she told him now. She slid around his body, her arms at his waist, coming between him and the sink, ducking under his thin arm. "I am clear on this one thing, Snape, this thing that you cannot get past. I know that you are not my father. I know the difference in your touch."  
  
"How can you." His voice was tired. "You know no other way."  
  
"You will not want to hear this, but I _do_ know another way. I have known Ron. I have known the touch of love, love that was not my father's sort of love."  
  
" _Weasley_ again."  
  
"Yes, Weasley again! Learn to deal with it!" Her voice grew hotter. "He was my first, not you. Though -- that night, after we first called the Needfire -- was the first time I had ever made love, do you see what I mean? You called it seduction, but Snape -- it was making love. And not my father's love. I want you for my lover, Snape, not my father."  
  
He leaned his forehead against hers and closed his eyes. _Oh, I want to believe you_.  
  
Hermione put her palms to his cheeks, lifting his head to look into his eyes. "This night, **_I_** will hold **_you_**. Now let's wash your face," she added softly. "This will not do. Then I'm taking you to bed where it's warm."


	21. Seemingly Haphazard

"I remember vividly a day years ago we were camping you knew more than you thought you should know,  
you said "I don't want ever to be brainwashed" and you were mind-boggling you were intense,  
you were uncomfortable in your own skin you were thirsty but mostly you were beautiful."

\-- Joining You. Alanis Morissette.

Holding him bore a strange sensation: almost unnatural, thought she reminded herself that salmons swam against the stream and nature consisted of anomalies. She might be, as Charlotte Bronte had once put it, a budding woodbine to heal his decay with freshness, or a plant growing about his roots.

Hermione could hardly say what drove her to offer this; Ron's hand the other day had been sweaty and sticky under her palm: she knew she would be washing his perspiration off her skin once the training session was over. Falling asleep beside her lover, however, was different, be it Snape or Ron.

Whenever she lay with Ron, she remembered a quick retreat into herself, as the heavy breathing and lazy, sweet silence of love's aftermath turned into awkward conversations. Lying in Snape's arms after he made love to her, however, was like time outside time. In a sense, time outside of her body. She would liquefy, molten sugar and sticky honey in his arms, and there would be no actual margins to her body. Even though he might enfold her, might determine a new edge simply by winding his arm around her waist and stating that this was the point where she ended and he began.

Which wouldn't be possible unless he had first perceived her as an intellectual and emotional being; unless she could pour herself over and onto him, mind to mind as well as body to body. So it wouldn't be like touching - not the physical action of bringing the limbs of two separate individuals closer to each other until they made a connection and one's sweat stained the other - but rather the mental application of transferring thoughts, notions, emotions and comfort through touch.

You are pathetic, Granger, she told herself desperately, lying to yourself in order to be allowed to hold him. Just look at the mental web you wove only to make this simple action possible, and now you're caught up in your ivory tower of rationalizations and will never be able to untangle yourself from his arms. Don't want to, in fact.

She was overwhelmed to hear Snape had visited her parents' house - her home - without ever consulting her. Without ever asking her permission. It was just like using Legilimens on her without her knowledge, stepping right into her most intimate memories - incarnated in flesh and blood; snow, bricks and stones - and defiling them simply because he looked at them with prejudice; with hatred. With murder in his eyes. It made her so sick she wanted to strangle him, then fill this large bathtub in his bathroom, plunge a scalpel into her wrists, and wait for the darkness to engulf her.

Was that what he thought of her? Of her parents? So she was a snake, lying in the wind-blown grass, waiting for a yellow- downed chick to cross her path? And her father: a perverted, seven-handed monster who lusted after his daughter? How could she, and why would she justify herself to him? What, after all, could she tell him? That Lester didn't need her; didn't want her? That she didn't know all this, or that it made her hate her father? It did, damn it, and it didn't stop her from loving him. Did Snape think that she wanted her father to touch her? Did he think she encouraged it? What could she say to the man she loved, who was in every way right, and in every way wrong?

So she just hurled her rage and sense of betrayal back at him, demanding to know what the hell he thought he was doing at her parent's house; almost shocked to see him retreating to the bathroom and slamming the door behind his back.

Alarmed, she listened to him retch, immediately reaching to knock on the door. Once inside, she saw she was right. He was sick. Over her? The tears prickled her eyes at the thought. Over her father?

"Because I make you sick?"

"Because of what I saw, because of what I did, because of the hurt I have caused you."

The realization that he did not condemn her had suddenly blown up her spit-bubble of anger and pain. The emotional blast, unbuckling her knees, sent her stumbling against the lintel. She wanted to cry. She wanted to wipe Snape's swollen lips with her thumb. How foolish we sometimes are, she mused. All our life busy shielding ourselves, making sure that the walls are high and strong, so no words can reach the other end without distortion. No wonder I fail to hear him and he fails to hear me. We are programmed never to hear the other person's true intentions.

And of course, the idiot man was trying to send her off once more. Didn't he realize by now that she wasn't going to let him? Small wonder then, that in the heat of the moment, she decided she might as well hold him as he held her. That she might as well want to hold him.

Washing the filth in the sink, Hermione ran a deep cleansing charm over the washbasin. Her pale, exhausted reflection wavering at her from the mirror, she held back Snape's hair while he washed his face and mouth, then quietly retreated, for him to brush his teeth. Only then did she slide her arms around his body, pulling him back to the bedroom and under the covers.

He was exhausted, this she could tell. Bluish circles were taking shape under his eyes, and the harsh line of his mouth had deepened and somehow loosened, as if his lips were carelessly pulled out of place. Snape objected, claiming he could not fall asleep beside another person. Soon enough, though, with her arms wound around him, he had indeed fallen asleep. For Hermione, it took a little longer than that.

She first thought of her plans for the next couple of months: school work; taking the boys to the Stones… the resumption of her, Harry and Ron's training; the formula of the charm designed to break reality's conditioning on integral numbers. Anything, but the fact she was holding him, which was a certain form of intimacy that felt terribly wrong for some reason. And yet right- it must have been right, really, with his head snugged between her breasts, and his breath warm on her naked skin… closing her eyes, it was the last thing she remembered thinking.

* * *

"Hermione…" Harry breathed in the frigid, lung-piercing air, "would you please tell me why are you wearing these stupid clothes and what the fuck are we doing outside - in this bloody chill - before there is even light??"

She gritted her teeth, reaching to rearrange her Gryffindor scarf so it would better prevent the frost from reaching her skin. Frowning, she lifted the scarf from its sagging loop about her neck, using it to cover her face from the hollow of her throat to her reddened nose. Satisfied with the results, she stretched it to cover her ears, and tucked its fringed ends neatly under the hood of her winter cloak. "As I said before," she muttered, "I will tell you everything when we get there."

He groaned. "I hope it's worth it."

"Sometimes you can be such a git."

"Try waking Ron to at 4:30," Harry retorted darkly. "See what he has to say about it."

It was the first ritual she would accomplish alone, without Snape's participation - without his knowledge, in fact - and Hermione was fairly nervous.

Only a day before she sneaked into the Forbidden forest, and grateful for her training - for bestowing her not only with power and strength but also with the ability to cast a heating sphere without using her wand - climbed into the same oak-tree from which she saw Snape gathering mistletoe that portentous September day. With her warm winter cloak set aside, so not to be in her way - she gathered the sacred rain water into a goatskin, then awkwardly climbed down to the ground. Damn the man for making it look so easy!

For the briefest of seconds, standing at the tree's foot where the foliage was too thick for the snow to reach the ground, she was reminded of the velvet upholstered drawer, where, along with her sacred ideals, a copy of the Bible, and the phallic, shiny black berretta, a black and white photograph of Severus Snape now lay, contrasting with the fierce hue of the blood-red fabric. Then the moment was gone, and Hermione moved to another oak tree, knowing she would have to visit multiple trees before the goatskin was full.

She had fasted that night, waking at a quarter to four in order to ready herself. Crook, who just returned from his night's prowl, had been fed a fresh can of tuna, and therefore was rather cooperative and didn't interrupt her preparation.

First, Hermione had taken a thorough shower, after which came the ritual cleansing. At half past four she descended to the common room. Ten minutes later, Harry joined her there.

Some of the castle's windows were casting a sallow light; watching Harry and her from a cliff-face as they made their way toward the Stones. A Cheshire-cat smile of a moon hung at the edge of the sky, apparently waiting for the sun to rise.

"What are we looking for?" asked Harry.

Knowing they were relatively close, she chose to answer. "A set of seemingly haphazardly arranged Standing Stones from the Teutonic period."

"A Stonehenge?"

"People expect a Stonehenge to appear to be circular at first sight," she said, frosty breath blowing like puffed sugar out of her lips. "The Stones, as I told you, look as if they were randomly located."

"I think I can see them!" he called. "I never knew Hogwarts had a Stonehenge!"

"Hardly anyone does. One might think Dumbledore warns the students not to enter the Forbidden Forest in order to assure no student would find them… it's almost as if someone wants to keep the Stones hidden…" aside from Snape, she added silently.

"Wow!" Harry seemed to have forgotten it was 5AM, bloody freezing and almost completely dark, and was now drinking in the sight of the Stones. "Who told you about this place?"

"No one," she said. "I discovered them myself, jogging." Though someone did teach me what I'm going to show you… she cringed at the thought of sharing Snape with Harry, knowing, in her heart of hearts, that once she shared her Druidic training, she would share everything. It was time to reveal secrets: at least her secrets. She hoped Harry might share his secrets with her as well: their power was in their unity. And they had to work together if they ever wanted to defeat Voldemort.

"We'll be taking Ron here as well, later this year," she continued, "but first I wanted to share this with you. Are you finished looking?"

Harry nodded. "Not much to see, but yes."

"Good." She hoped she didn't sound too nervous. "Come over here."

Together, they approached the center piece, where she had stood with Snape so many times before. Snape's presence, she remembered, suddenly chilled, would take away the worst of the cold. She thought it merely had to do with having a warm body beside her, but now, with Harry standing next to her, she realized it was another trick of her mind: another illusion. Another black and white photo, to stain Sally and Conrad's blood-red snow.

"What's now?" Harry inquired, watching her piling a small heap of incense on the stone altar.

"Just watch and be quiet," she ordered him. "Or else I might lose my concentration."

Closing her eyes, she began the simple, but beautiful ritual of summoning the Needfire. Here were no candles, nor a wax-skinned image of Jesus looking down at her with tortured, painted marble eyes, like the one she remembered from the Anglican church of her childhood. There would be no priest or sweet voiced choir to ascend the community's collective prayers to heaven, only her, and the snow and the Stones, singing in the first rays of dawn. Here, in this stone and earth temple of Gaia, lived no tamed, church-dwelling God: though perhaps Severus's God and Goddesses visited there. Here, she believed, churned raw magic, which sizzled when summoned, simmered and stewed deep in the ground otherwise. Magic, in its purest and most basic form: the power to create a new thing where there was none. Love. Life. Needfire.

She had no sickle of her own, but a blade, disjointed from a single-use razor, did the job for her. Cutting exactly deep enough to draw blood, she saluted the Gods, called up the sun, put the moon to rest, and summoned the Needfire.

A sense of becoming gripped her body, starting as the smallest noise in her womb, where a tiny blossom was awoken to life; wide-eyed and gaping as the bright, beautiful noise spread through her body, through her circulation to the edges of her being. She didn't have Snape's drag queen cloak with her, but for that slip of a moment, when the Needfire curled silvery fingers out of the sizzling air and reached to kindle the offering, Hermione wanted to fly, too.

The cuckoo called, once, and sharply. And the incense burned, wafting its sweet, tangy fragrance.

Harry, at her side, watched her with mild boredom.

Glaring, she reached for his hand, dragging him for the nearest stone gate, where an invisible power shield formed an impenetrable wall.

"What?" Harry asked.

"Try to walk through," she told him.

He shrugged his shoulders, and blissfully unaware of the Needfire's true nature, walked straight into the power shield. "What is it?" Harry cried out, now sitting on the snow-covered ground, where he had fallen after slamming into the magical wall.

"A power shield," Hermione told him simply. "No magic can breach it. No magic can remove it. It stays on, until the Needfire consumes the incense. Can't you see the potential?"

Harry's eyes widened as the understanding slowly dawned on him. "If - if we manage to draw Voldemort here… alone-"

"Many ifs," she concluded dryly. "But that is so far our best plan, don't you think?"

He nodded slowly. "Muggles think the use of the Stones is long forgotten… I think wizards, too- somebody must have taught you this-" Harry said. "Somebody else is in the plan."

"Not exactly."

"What do you mean?"

Hermione breathed deeply. She knew it would come out eventually, sooner or later. "I thought of using the Stones for trapping Voldemort inside… The person who taught me this appeared to have thought of it too, and refined my basic plan, in a way to make me believe it would be our best course of action."

The boy who lived gave her a quizzical look. "Who is he?"

"The man I love," she replied.

"Not very informative."

"True."

The greyish, diluted rays of dawn sprayed off Harry's eyeglasses. "Hermione, who taught you this?"

"Snape."

"Snape??" Harry nearly spouted. "You mean as in Professor Snape?"

"You'd hardly expect me to call him Professor when we're in bed, now would you?" she retorted as calmly as possible, fighting to calm down the anger building inside her at Harry's aggravating reaction.

Harry, on his part, stared at her in disbelief. His soft, pink lips - slightly scorched by the frost - were partially open; emerald eyes huge and confused behind the ridiculous frame of his spectacles. "I can't imagine you calling your lover by his surname, either," he said at last, looking dumber than ever.

"Why?" she asked, still irritated. "How would you call yours?"

Harry took a deep breath. "I'd call him Draco."

Flinching - the frozen air frosting the soft, moistened hollows of her palate - she stared at Harry. Hackneyed imagery indeed, she mused, but I suddenly feel as if all the pieces of a puzzle are falling into place. "Well," Hermione said, blinking, as if she was trying to force the idea - the visual concept of Harry and Draco together - past her eyelids, "that definitely explains several things."

He sighed. "Ron is so not going to understand this."

"No," she answered. "Not at first. I don't think you understand my choice to be with Snape, either. And I can honestly tell you I don't know what it is you see in Malfoy. But I suppose we owe each other this acceptance. However, I can also tell you something about Ron-" the open, lovely face of the redheaded boy she fell in love with wavering in her mind. "Something you had probably forgotten, and me too, to some degree: Ron is more tolerant than the both of us. Remember where he came from. Remember who his parents are. Remember that his loyalty to you is above all else. When it's time to reveal the truth to him, he will come to terms with it."

* * *

Back in Hogwarts, there was already some light morning traffic in the castle's corridors. Several Ravenclaws who had been early to rise were making their way towards the library; the suits of armor, charmed by the smallish Professor Flitwick, burst into cheerful Christmas carols - including one suit which began singing the Beatles' "Let it Be", probably one of the students' practical joke. Christmas, she realized, noting the ivy tendrils decorating the hallways, was materializing around her.

It made her think of waking up on Christmas morning; pearly, snow-screened light streaming through her window's shutters, playing along her quilt. She would stretch, yawning; thinking it was just a morning like any other, then the realization would strike her. It was Christmas morning! At that she would push the covers aside, and leaping out of bed, run to her parents' bedroom where Donna and Lester would still be sleeping.

The same pearly light would glow in the Granger couple's bedroom, entering the vast, airy room from the French door at its rear. It would crawl among the thick fibers of the carpet, moving slowly until it reached the foot of the bed, where the five year old Hermione was standing now. Careful as ever, she used to climb up onto the soft, expensive mattress, and smiling, turned to settle herself. There, in her mind's eye was Donna: wafting a rich, dulcet fragrance of silk and costly night-creams; facing the Queen Anne wardrobe at the other side of the room. And at Donna's side was Lester: facing his wife, his scent strong and masculine and good; inducing comfort and security. So five year old Hermione crawled between the two, their heavy quilt - giving off their mingled scents, mixed into a strange but not unpleasant fragrance- crushed under her small body.

Donna sighed, retreating into the covers, muttering something about the dinner party planned for later and about needing her sleep; Hermione should go away to her room and not interrupt her parents' rest. This reaction was only to be expected and child Hermione didn't mind it in the least. Lester, however, sprawled on the other side of the king sized bed, had sleepily lifted the edge of the blanket, urging her to get inside, "before Mummy's rear end freezes."

She remembered giggling, sneaking into the good, suffocating heat beneath the quilt. Lester's arms reached to draw her nearer, and closing her eyes, she snuggled against his strong, wide chest.

"What're you thinking of?" asked Harry, waking her from her short reverie.

"Christmas," she answered shortly, wishing to get rid of the tangy, bittersweet memories which would come to haunt her. "The feast is in a couple of days, isn't it?"

"Monday, in fact. Already bought presents?"

"Last Hogsmeade weekend," she told him. "While you and Ron were busy drooling over the new Firebolt model."

Harry's eyes flashed with indignation. "If you'd only seen that broom you would never have-"

"Understood why you are so excited about it," she interrupted.

He screwed up his face, but nonetheless, maintained the friendly, comprehensive silence the both of them were careful to keep on their return from the Stones. The place, she reflected now that they were back in the castle, seemed to release some natural hindrances in people; it made it possible to talk, or perhaps the talking made it necessary to keep silent, at least for a while. They let out so much of themselves, there; on the pure white snow, that she was relatively sure the snow could no longer be white. It must have turned grey, she mused, grey and pink, like one's soul is grey and gelatinous, with pinkish, quivering tendons to connect it to the body.

She asked him about Draco - Hermione could no longer refer to Harry's Draco Malfoy the way she referred to the arrogant, obnoxious, Slytherin - finding it difficult to understand why would Harry fall in love with the boy who did nothing but bully and mock him from his first day at Hogwarts.

"Well, you see," Harry told her, "I never meant to fall for him. He's really the worst prick imaginable. I surely never meant to go to bed with him. Well, he was a boy, right?" He shrugged his shoulders. "We were fighting one day, just a short while after the year started. He cornered me in some deserted corridor. His goons were missing, no teachers around to prevent me from aiming a fist straight into that pasty face of his… the next moment we were kissing like madmen. It was the first time I ever had sex. For real." Harry wore a lost, yet focused expression, so sharp with love and longing that he could probably melt the soft, soluble snow with his gaze. "I thought it was because he was a boy and so I must be gay, or at least bisexual. After all, I did sleep with a couple girls…" light blush appeared on Harry's cheeks as he said that. "Well, I tried… other boys. Didn't want to be with Draco Malfoy, if you get what I mean. It was better than being with women, though not much better. Kept sleeping with him, all that time. Seemed like a much more gratifying option to bullying. We could hate each other and have sex with each other instead of hate each other and spend all our fucking time circling each other. Sex is way better, I can tell you."

She nodded, urging him to go on talking.

"It would make him nuts that I was seeing other blokes. Not that Draco was ever celibate," Harry snorted. "Oh no. He's having all of them. He would rut against anything with a pulse. I suppose it made me nuts as well."

"So what did you do?"

"He told me he'd kill me if I'd ever again slept with another man. I told him the same goes for him. We've been sort of together, ever since."

"But not publicly."

"Not publicly," Harry sighed, rubbing his eyes and shifting his spectacles into an awkward position while doing so.

"You want to," she said, disturbed that, somehow, his pain soaked so deeply into her that her womb clenched.

Harry's lips tightened. "Well, I do, but it's complicated. His father would slaughter him first thing if he realized Draco is seeing me. I told him he can switch sides- Dumbledore would protect him if I make it clear it is my wish, but Draco, Draco…"

"Draco… what…?" sensing there was something deeper here, she both wished she could soothe Harry's pain, and that there might be someone else, better qualified for the job, to lift this burden off her shoulders.

"He won't disobey his father," Harry answered. "He won't go against Lucius' wish. Not unless he must. Lucius Malfoy, this monster of a man- he loves him-"

A muscle in her jaw clenched. "Lucius is his father!" she cut into Harry's words, as recollections from one of her own conversations with Snape floated into the front of her brain.

…I love my father…! she heard her own voice ring with fury. …I won't sit here and listen to you condemn him…!

"But he is a monster!" Harry protested.

Hermione's nostrils flared. "Lucius Malfoy may be a monster, Harry, but he is nonetheless Draco's father. And Draco loves him. You would gain nothing by asking Draco to go against Lucius."

Harry nodded slowly, sadly. "I suppose I knew it."

"Good. Don't push him," she added, softening her voice. "You'll see, when this war is over, then it will be the time for you."

This hint of an argument, Hermione assumed, might have clouded their conversation, but then, there was no place for such undercurrents of animosity when one felt so exposed. The mind would not bear it. She told Harry about Snape, piling her own heap of quivering, greyish soul on the snow, alongside his; knowing he would touch it with the utmost carefulness; that his small and slender fingers wouldn't pry and tear, only probe gently, until she could no longer stand it and ask him to stop. She told him about Lester, and was relieved to notice that beside the sorrow floating like something tangible in Harry's big, beautiful eyes, there was no murder in them. Just the calm, broken peace, of someone who had been betrayed by those who were supposed to love him, and knew that the memories were nothing but ash. That you couldn't live off your indignation. Hermione suspected this was one lesson that Harry Potter could teach Severus Snape.

"Come in," she invited him, once they reached her Head Girl room. "I'll brew us a pot, then you can go back to sleep."

Harry accepted her invitation with a quick, boyish smile, closing the door behind him. Crookshanks - sprawled on Hermione's bed in what was a very faithful imitation of a fur carpet - lifted one ear to greet them.

"Hello, pug-face," she greeted the cat, leaning to scratch Crook's head and neck.

Being fed a few hours earlier and knowing that the bowl of cat-food was always available to him in the corner, the tom was a bit reluctant to leave his warm spot in order to demand his mistress to provide him with something more palatable. Seeing that she was indeed fulfilling her duty and giving him a proper scratch, the half-Kneazle decided that staying put and allowing Hermione to go on scratching, was the least of all possible evils.

"Harry," she called. "Would you please do me a favour and scratch Crook while I'm brewing?"

"Sure." The dark haired boy landed on the bed with a thump, reaching his hand to scratch between the half-Kneazle's ears. Crookshanks, who had no obvious objections to this arrangement, purred loudly. "You know, Hermione," Harry said. "You really look better, calmer… less cranky."

"I told you I feel better," she answered, moving to pull out two china mugs from a small cupboard.

He nodded. "I know, I remember. You were never like that with Ron," he added. "Happy."

She swallowed. "Well, Ron was something else altogether. I loved him. Love him, too."

"Yeah, well," Harry gently stroked Crookshanks' belly. "I'm happy for you, you know. Even if I still think Snape is a git."


	22. Happy Holidays

_little tree  
little silent Christmas tree  
you are so little  
you are more like a flower  
\--  
i will kiss your cool bark  
and hug you safe and tight  
just as your mother would,  
only don't be afraid  
  
look the spangles  
that sleep all the year in a dark box  
dreaming of being taken out and allowed to shine,  
the balls the chains the red and gold the fluffy threads,  
  
put up your little arms  
and i'll give them all to you to hold  
every finger shall have its ring  
and there won't be a single place dark or unhappy  
  
\--excerpts from "little tree"  
  
\-- e.e.cummings_  
  
  
  
The bed was jolting. Snape groaned and put a foot on the floor to stop it, thinking he was drunk. It didn't help.  
  
"Happy, happy Christmas!" Hermione sang loudly. "Wake up, Snape!"  
  
"Stop shaking the bed, Hermione."  
  
"Crab." She was walking on the mattress, reaching up for the velvet curtains, sending them back to the bedposts with extravagant motions, their wooden rings rattling loudly along the drapery rails, letting in the air, the morning, the holiday.  
  
"Wench," he muttered, and grabbed the tail of her nightshirt -- one of his own shirts, which she had raided from his armoire -- to pull her down where he could kiss her thoroughly and tease a nipple. "Here is my happy Christmas present for you." He guided her hand under the blankets to his cock, which was already leaping.  
  
"Saint Nicholas you're not," she muttered against his mouth. "Your beard is scratchy. And I hope I'm getting more than this...there's not even a ribbon on it."  
  
"Let me tuck it in its warm, wet stocking," Snape whispered to her. "See if you like that better."  
  
She started to laugh. "And then I suppose you'll want to take it out again."  
  
"And put it back..."  
  
"And take it out..."  
  
"And put it back..."  
  
"Idiot man." She sat up to look at him, pushing her tumbled hair out of her face, flushed and smiling.  
  
It was a good Christmas, the best he could remember, spending late-night Christmas Eve in front of the fireplace in his rooms, once his hallway rounds were done and Hermione's duties in the Gryffindor common room were finished. Sitting on his lap and pointing her wand at the flames from time to time to make them dance, she had told him all the Christmas traditions she could remember, everything he had missed as a child. And now shortly he would give her his gifts, and see her smile again. He had not slept until almost dawn, watching Hermione sleeping next to him, in his bluish wandlight.  
  
"I did get you a gift," she said now, bouncing across him to clamber out of bed and rush to her school bag, in his parlor. While she was out of the room, Snape summoned his own small box from the armoire and hid it beneath the blankets, between his knees, out of sight and general touch. She was back within moments, breathing quickly, bright-eyed, and kneeling on the bed expectantly.  
  
Snape looked at the book-sized, flat package that rested on his chest. "It's a book," he announced.  
  
"Of course it is," Hermione said. "But you must open it. See which book it is."  
  
He slid his eyes at her. "It will be something educational. I know you. A lesson planner, or more lust potions."  
  
She poked his ribs. "Snape!"  
  
"I'm opening it, I'm opening it." He struggled to a sitting position, propping himself on pillows. Hermione's eyes gleamed. He began carefully to pick the package open, so as not to tear the festive paper.  
  
"Oh, Merlin, Snape, you're supposed to tear open packages!" And she reached to help him. "You would think no one's ever given you a present before."  
  
"Bloody few," he muttered. She sobered a moment, then smiled and spoke again.  
  
"Well, that trend is over. What do you think of it?"  
  
It was a Muggle book on nutrition. Snape leafed through it, finding whole sections on balanced diets and the chemical makeup of many foods. There was also a section of recipes, enough like potions that he paused and began reading seriously. How like her to give him such a present, something to improve himself, and yet -- how enjoyable. He was deeply involved in a recipe for asparagus soup when Hermione prodded him again.  
  
"Snape!"  
  
"What?"  
  
"Did you get me a present?"  
  
"It would be inappropriate for a Hogwarts professor to buy a gift for a student," he said primly.  
  
"It is also inappropriate for a Hogwarts professor to _fuck_ a student," Hermione said.  
  
"I would like to think we could get through a conversation without _that_ word coming out of your mouth."  
  
"I say it less frequently than I did. Snape. Happy Christmas!" Apparently there would be no repressing her good mood today.  
  
"Your gift is under the blankets," he told her now, turning back to the book. She looked a little crestfallen, but snuggled against him anyway, pulling the blankets over herself. She read with him and pointed out the high protein recipes.  
  
"And these with spinach. I think you're anemic."  
  
Snape set the book aside. "Come here," he said. "I'll show you anemic." And in the resulting happy wrestling, her knee touched something unfamiliar under the blankets, and she let out a cry.  
  
"You did get me something!"  
  
"I did say it was under the blankets."  
  
She dove under like a seal into water, and surfaced immediately with the small package, wrapped in green and silver foil. It was only seconds before the paper was off and crumpled in the middle of his bed, and the box open.  
  
"Oh, Snape." She held the sickle, turning it, watching the play of light along the blade.  
  
"It's sharp," he reminded her.  
  
"It's beautiful. But what else is here?" She found something small still wrapped in tissue in the box. In a few moments, the netsuke for the thong of the sickle lay in her palm, a carving, in white marble, of a lovely and feminine hand, holding a snail shell. She stared at it for so long that Snape feared she didn't like it, but when her gaze lifted to his, and he saw the sheen of tears, that fear vanished.  
  
He put his hand along her jawline and spoke seriously. "White, to remind you that you are already clean." He leaned to kiss her. "When you feel the need to rasp yourself into redness, my apprentice, I want you to look at that hand, that white hand, and tell yourself you are pure. You are clean. Happy Christmas, Hermione."  
  


~*~

  
  
The Christmas Feast, as usual, saw the Great Hall rearranged so that all the students and teachers who had remained at Hogwarts could sit together at one table. Snape sat between Minerva and Flitwick, and Hermione, several seats away on the same side of the table, was between Potter and a Ravenclaw girl whose name Snape had never bothered to learn. Hogwarts Head Girl had not stayed with him long that morning, needing to get back to her Tower to open the gifts from family and friends, and share the day with her fellow students.  
  
Dumbledore began the meal with his usual toast, a few platitudes and cheerful announcements, and then the feast appeared and everyone tucked in. Snape found himself unaccountably hungry, and was considering the nutritional content of many of the foods on the table. Instead of limiting his menu to grains and fruit, he had several slices of goose and a heap of chestnut stuffing as well. _If I continue to be happy, I shall grow fat, and then who will be afraid of me? Unskeleton Snape._  
  
He unobtrusively slid his small gifts to Flitwick and Minerva, who seemed pleased with his choices. Flitwick swished his new swizzle stick at the plum pudding and made all the holly leaves, placed as a garnish, circle the table in a brief spiky parade. Minerva unwrapped a precious and tiny garnet bottle of his sandalwood and cardamom cologne, specially distilled for her in the potions dungeon. She dabbed a tiny amount on the new linen handkerchief he'd purchased for her, one edged with red and gold spider silk ribbons from a lingerie shop in Diagon Alley. She sniffed deeply before she tucked it into her sleeve pocket. "If it weren't so public," she whispered to him, smiling her three-cornered smile, "I would kiss your pasty cheek, Severus. Thank you."  
  
And of course, Dumbledore insisted they all pull crackers together, and wear the stupid hats that came out of them. Snape's hat was a French chapeau, plumed in gaudy purple. He kicked it under the table immediately. Minerva fished it out and put it on herself. She did not like the maid's mobcap that had come in her cracker. She offered it in trade, which Snape refused with a curl of his lip and a sneering glance. Flitwick had a leprechaun's bright green top hat, and sat beneath it, smiling cheerily. Snape could not see Hermione's hat without leaning far out over the table, but Malfoy was wearing a dark colored derby with a flickering blue hatband, and staring across the table at Potter. Something in Malfoy's gaze reminded Snape of the way he felt when he saw Hermione unexpectedly: hungry, predatory, territorial, and ever so slightly ill-at-ease. _What's happened to Slytherin's princeling? Coveting a Gryffindor as well? What's wrong with us? What's wrong with our own kind, that they no longer satisfy us?_  
  


~*~

  
  
The days between Christmas and New Year's Eve passed swiftly, and relatively uneventfully. Snape and Hermione found time to be together most days, although she only spent a night or two with him during that time. It seemed she and Potter had much to talk about; their heads were always together at meals, and they were forever in the library, whispering, drawing schematics he could never quite see when he skulked by, looking for his apprentice, longing to pull her into some dark corner and steal a tender morsel of her time and her lips. When Potter saw him doing this, those green eyes of Lily's seemed to follow him knowingly; and was it Snape's imagination, or did Potter seem to know what was going on between himself and Hermione?  
  
When he passed them in the library for the third time on New Year's Eve day, shuttling pointlessly between shelves, carrying books and putting them in the wrong places (for which Madame Pince would have had his head), he finally heard Hermione following him.  
  
"What is it you want?" she hissed. "Can't you see we're busy?"  
  
Snape glanced around them, and tugged her into a small alcove near a window. He risked a single, deep kiss, his tongue sweeping into her mouth for mere moments. It was not enough, for either of them. "I want you," he whispered hotly, and set her away from him.  
  
Hermione glanced around them as well, and softly closed her scorching palm on the front of his trousers, her fingers cupping his testicles. "And you shall have me," she whispered back. "I want us to be fucking at midnight, to ring in the New Year." And then she was gone, back to Potter, leaving Snape gaping, alone with his erection in the Restricted Section. He should have known better than to dare a Gryffindor. Lily had taught him that. But then he blinked, staring into space. It was the first time, outside his quarters, that he had initiated sexual contact with Hermione. _Here be dragons, Snape._  
  
By the time Hermione slipped into his quarters that evening -- quite early, only an hour after dinner in the Great Hall, Snape's desire for her had risen to a frightening pitch. The mere thought of what they had dared -- a single kiss and a quick caress -- in relative public in the library, had occupied his mind almost to the exclusion of all else. He had tried to distract himself by spending the afternoon readying the Potions classroom for the start of classes after the New Year. It didn't help. He had knocked back a shot of Jameson's, hoping to take the edge off. It didn't help, either. Instead it warmed the blood in his veins and made him think it might be a good idea to go looking for her again to see what more she might dare, in that Restricted Section. Recognizing his own stupidity, Snape took himself off to his quarters for a long and calming tub bath, which only made him wish for company in the hot water, fragrant with fir essence. Finally he stomped off to dinner, was abrupt to Minerva and Flitwick when they asked if he wanted to join them on the top of the Astronomy tower at midnight to watch Hagrid flying his hippogriffs in celebration, and stomped back to his quarters to wait for Hermione.  
  
"Where _have_ you been," he demanded, rising from his armchair, meeting her halfway across the parlor, yanking her schoolbag from her fingers, and quickly disrobing them both with a flick or two of his wand. Their clothing fell in a mingled heap on the floor, and Snape lifted his young lover into his arms and carried her off to bed. She was chuckling by the time he deposited her on the green sheets, but that quickly ended as she welcomed him into her body, already wet and luscious with desire, and met his heated kisses with nibbles and demands of her own. He took her quickly, to slake his immediate thirst, and afterwards she lay panting and flushed, but unsatisfied.  
  
"Well, that was rude," she muttered, but with the faintest of smiles. "You owe me, Snape."  
  
"I'm aware of that. I'll make it up to you." He moved to the side, but his left hand slid down her belly and into the moist curls between her legs, slick and hot still with the evidence of his own pleasure. His clever fingers found a sensitive place and circled it until she was arching off the bed, and then his mouth took over the job, sucking, biting, until she gasped her ecstasy. Her fingers tangled in his hair, holding him against her, trembling helplessly, gradually writhing over the bed until her head dangled over the far side. The mingled taste of their desire was exciting to him and he fed there greedily, taking her to a second peak, and then a third, stronger than the first two.  
  
When he finally relented, she was weak and sweating. Snape crawled up next to her and kissed, open-mouthed, the arched column of her throat, bent over the edge of his bed.  
  
"Merlin," she whispered shakily, and allowed him to drag her under the blankets to lie completely wrung out, on his chest. He was amused by the tremendous yawn she gave.  
  
"I hope that will suffice for now. Happy New Year," he told her.  
  
"Not until midnight," she said, "and remember there is yet another task for you then."  
  
"Yes," he said. "Making love at midnight, I remember. Are you sure you wouldn't rather go up to the Astronomy tower, and watch Hagrid flying his hippogriffs in formation to celebrate?"  
  
Her drowsy pinch of his buttock was half-hearted. With another yawn, she drifted to sleep.  
  
A few minutes before midnight, according to the clock over the bedroom fireplace, Snape woke his lover by trapping her beneath him and settling firmly between her legs. She looked up at him drowsily, but waked when she felt his hardness probing at her entrance.  
  
"You're selfish tonight," she said, but she was already wrapping her legs about his waist to assist him. He had taken no more than a few long, slow strokes when there was a knocking on his door.  
  
They both froze, heads turning, as if they could see through the bedroom wall and the outer door to the hallway beyond.  
  
"Expecting someone?" Hermione asked dryly.  
  
"You know I am not. Ignore it." He continued to move, and the two of them had just begun to settle into a slow rhythm when the knock came again, louder this time, accompanied by a voice they both recognized.  
  
Minerva McGonagall, pounding on the door, demanding to know if Snape was inside.  
  
"Fuck," muttered Snape.  
  
"Language," taunted Hermione, but her smile faded as he stared down at her, black eyes even darker with concern.  
  
"Stay here and be silent," he said, withdrawing from her body and belting his dressing gown around him. He yanked the bed draperies closed and closed the door to his bedroom before hurrying to the door of his quarters, not a moment too soon.  
  
Minerva was steadily dismantling his wards, he could feel them dropping, and she had the last one down and was through the door before he could flick his wand to tidy himself or swish the pile of discarded clothing into hiding. The best he could hope for was to block her view, and so he stood in front of her, glowering as intimidatingly as possible.  
  
Her blue-eyed stare was furious.  
  
"Do you know what's going on in your House's common room, Severus? You're not there, and Draco is not there, and those idiot Slytherins have all but destroyed the room." Her gaze flicked up and down him, taking in his tousled hair, the hastily belted dressing gown, and his bare legs. Her eyes narrowed. "You weren't sleeping," she informed him. Her lip curled a bit, reminding him of himself. "And you positively reek of sex."  
  
"Why were you in my House's common room?" he demanded furiously, attempting to distract her through his own anger. "What need have you of anyone, or anything, Slytherin?"  
  
Minerva gritted her teeth. "I had need of at least one of my seventh year students, someone to control the other notional Gryffindors at midnight, to get everyone to bed shortly afterwards. But my Head Girl is not in her room -- in fact, she's nowhere to be found, and neither is Harry. So I went to Slytherin, looking for Draco, since Harry must surely be nearby."  
  
"I see. And?"  
  
"As I said, no Draco, either. Severus, what _have_ you been doing?"  
  
"I would have thought it obvious," he said archly. "Ringing in my New Year."  
  
"Merciful Merlin," she said. "It looks like you've been rolled in Knockturn Alley by a cheap...date. No wonder you weren't interested in Hagrid's little celebration." She pushed past him, intending to sit in one of his armchairs, and it was then that she saw the pile of clothing.  
  
Snape's heart began to pound. He needed to swallow and suddenly could not.  
  
Minerva's incisive gaze moved from the clothing -- Hogwarts school robes, and the smallest corner of a Head Girl badge peeping from the pile -- to Hermione's schoolbag, on the floor next to a chair. That tatty, red and gold schoolbag with the picture of Gilderoy Lockhart drawn childishly on the side. Unmistakable.  
  
Snape felt his knees go weak. _This is it_ , he thought. _The moment I've been dreading. We are discovered. We are undone_.  
  
"Extra tutoring," spat Minerva now, clutching at the back of the armchair. "Such concern for the Gryffindor Head Girl. Vanishing for hours at a time, never in her rooms at bed check, which I've just let slide thinking she was studying somewhere else -- and you, accusing her parents of abuse, recommending she not be sent home over the holidays -- Merlin, _Snape, you vile Slytherin bastard, where is Hermione?_ "  
  
"Minerva --"  
  
"Don't speak to me! How dare you corrupt the morals of that girl! How dare you use your position to -- to --"  
  
"It isn't like that," he interjected.  
  
Minerva raised her wand and pointed it at him. "Where is she? And don't lie to me, I'll know it if you do. Snape, if you've hurt that girl, I will slit your throat myself."  
  
"Minerva --"  
  
"She's right here," came a voice from behind him.  
  
"I told you to stay in there," he gasped, whirling. Hermione was wearing his other dressing gown, much too large for her, the sleeves folded back more than once, the shoulder seams reaching halfway between her elbow and shoulder, the hem nearly touching the floor. It made her look even younger than she was, and it was clear she was naked underneath. _Daddy's little girl, playing dress-up_.  
  
Minerva burst into tremulous gasping. "Oh, Hermione, what has he done to you?"  
  
The barefoot girl came further into the parlor, and despite Snape's efforts to keep her behind him, stood in front and leaned back against him. "Nothing I didn't want him to do to me, Professor McGonagall," she said now. Snape drew a shaky breath and put his hands on her shoulders.  
  
"Hermione, go back inside and close the door. This is between Minerva and me."  
  
"Not when it concerns both our futures, it's not," she said.  
  
"You dare to touch her in front of me!" Minerva gasped.  
  
"I would dare much for Hermione," he said shakily. "And have done so." His hands clenched on her shoulders, and she looked up at him, her eyes glowing. She turned in his hold and pulled his face down for a kiss, brief, but sincere, and very much like applying accelerant to Minerva's fiery fury.  
  
"Young woman," said Minerva, now, very pale, her lips thinning. "You will take your things and go to your room and wait for me there. We must discuss your punishment, but first -- Snape, you realize this means dismissal." Minerva's voice was shaky now, as well. Snape realized how very much she was hurt by what she had discovered. Her favorite student, Hogwarts Head Girl, shagged by her dear friend, the newly vile Potions Master.  
  
"Wait a moment," said Hermione, speaking to her Head of House.  
  
"Don't make this worse," said Snape.  
  
"She needs to understand."  
  
"I've already seen and heard too much tonight," said Minerva. She turned on her heel. "Snape, meet me in Headmaster Dumbledore's office in ten minutes. That should give you time to clean the...smell...off yourself." She waited at the door, holding it open, pointedly waiting for Hermione to pass through ahead of her.  
  
"Go," said Snape in her ear. "I'll find a way to communicate with you, but later." He gave her shoulders one last squeeze. "I..." his voice dropped to a whisper, to tell her the one thing he could never tell Lily. The thing that would gut him, and leave his heart in her small, square hands. "I love you. Go." He gave her a little shove towards Minerva. Wordlessly, with several backwards glances of astonishment, Hermione gathered her things and left the room.  
  
Minerva had one last parting shot. "I cannot tell you how this hurts, Severus."  
  
He turned on his heel, so she would not see the water that rose in his eyes. A moment later the door slammed and his quarters were silent. They were not tears for his love, or even tears for their discovery, though that hurt as well. They were tears because he had hurt a good friend, and with that one action, lost her forever.  
  
  


~*~

  
  
It had been a harrowing scene in Dumbledore's office. Minerva, her last ounce of control gone, could hardly speak in her spluttering fury, and so Snape finally told the story himself. Dumbledore had looked at him coldly. No one was seated.  
  
"I am disappointed in you, Severus."  
  
"I understand."  
  
"If only you showed some remorse...I might be able to accept a resignation. But as it stands, I must sack you instead."  
  
"I have no remorse for my actions," Snape said. It was true; were it to all be done again, he would still teach Hermione Druidism, he would still celebrate the rituals with her at the Stones, and he would still have fallen in love with her, made love with her, and done anything he could to protect her, including hurting her if it were for her own good. "But what will you do to Hermione?"  
  
" _Miss Granger_ ," said Dumbledore, with heavy emphasis.  
  
"Will you expel her? Transfer her?" _I know what you want, you bastard_ , thought Snape. _You want her here, with Potter and Weasley, your three pawns. None will be allowed to leave -- unless they die trying, noble Gryffindor children that they are -- until your business with Voldemort is finished_.  
  
"By rights I should do both. But..." and the old man looked Snape up and down, in his black clothing. There was not a trace of the famous Dumbledore twinkle in his icy blue eyes. "Were I to expel her, that would put her in reach of your predatory hands. And a transfer would not be much better. No, I think -- I think that we will simply strip her Head Girl's badge and privileges from her and confine her to the dormitories after classes and meals, until she graduates." His head swung to Minerva. "Minerva, my dear, go and find Hermione, and make sure she gathers up her things from her room, and take her back to Gryffindor Tower to be with her peers. Once this gets out it won't be easy for any of us, but she cannot be allowed to retain her elevated status."  
  
Minerva, wet-eyed with rage, Snape's Christmas hanky clutched in her hand and dabbing at her nose, left Dumbledore's office.  
  
Dumbledore put both hands on his desk and leaned forward. "You will pack your things tonight, Severus, and be gone before breakfast. Never darken the door of Hogwarts again. Never attempt to communicate with Hermione again while she is in my care, or I will see to it that charges are brought against you. As it stands, her parents may choose to bring them against you themselves."  
  
"Let them," said Snape, putting his own palms flat on the desk and leaning aggressively towards the older wizard. "They are unfit parents, and I have proof of that. It would destroy Hermione for that to come out, but I will bring counter charges on her behalf if that becomes necessary. Is that clear, Headmaster?"  
  
Dumbledore met and held his gaze for a long, long moment. He did not respond to Snape's threat. Instead, he said, "There is that one other job you do for me."  
  
Snape's lip curled into a vile grin. "I think you can consider that task completed, _sir_. I'll not spy for you any longer." _However, I **will** spy for Hermione, and the other children Voldemort has in his wicked sights. And I will find a way to communicate with Hermione. She, and Potter, and Weasley -- and even Malfoy -- need my information more than ever now. You will not keep me from her in this way_.  
  
"Severus, you owe it to Hogwarts to continue to funnel such information as may be helpful."  
  
"I owe Hogwarts a great deal, that is true. But I'll not spy for you, Headmaster. I'm not your whipping boy with Voldemort. You're never surprised by the information I bring you, anyway -- I'm always the last to know, it seems. _You don't need me, and you haven't for a very long time_." He straightened away from the desk and turned to leave.  
  
"Severus."  
  
"Make it quick, Albus, I have packing to do."  
  
"Where will you go?"  
  
Snape turned, and was surprised to see a look verging on pity in Dumbledore's eyes. "I have no idea," he said, and left, closing the door quietly behind him.  
  


~*~

  
  
In the end, there wasn't much to pack. He would send for his books once he had a place to stay, except for Hermione's present, which went into his luggage, and a few of his most precious Potions references. His clothing was shrunk and stuffed into a carryall. He went to his office and fetched all his druid clothing and tools from their locked cupboard and looked around the office and classroom for the last time. Despite all his protestations about how he despised teaching dunderheads, he was proud of his accomplishments here.  
  
But, mostly, he was sorry to leave Hermione, Minerva, and Flitwick behind.  
  
_Angharad: "Someday there will come one that you do not wish to hurt. And when that time comes you will find that 'must' **must** equal could, or you will lose that one as well. _"  
  
It seemed that day had come; but at least he had told her he loved her. He had managed that much.  
  
He took some Floo powder from the urn on his office mantelpiece, tossed it into the fireplace, and said, "Malfoy Manor."  
  
Then Snape stepped inside with his bags, and vanished.


	23. The Wire

"When I am still I can hear  
You speak most clearly  
  
Father can you help me  
For the ocean is big  
And my boat is small  
  
Find the courage."  
  
Movement VI: Innocence. Alanis Morissette.  
  
  
"You realize that I am gravely disappointed in you." There was no merry twinkle in Albus Dumbledore's eyes as he ordered her to surrender her Head Girl's badge. The badge, she supposed, would go to Mandy Brocklehurst, whom she liked and appreciated, but still, it was hardly a compensation for the fact it had been taken from her. Not for falling in love with a man who happened to be her teacher.  
  
 _And yet_ , Hermione reflected, _these are the rules of the world. Never play with fire if you are unwilling to be burned. Unfair, yes_ , she thought bitterly as she handed her badge to the Hogwarts' Headmaster. _But rules are rules, and they are to be followed and respected. Keep them, or else you must surrender your delicate neck and your Head Girl's badge to Madame Guillotine, once you are caught breaking them_.  
  
The ancient wizard smiled sadly in return. Now that her head was rolling on the blood-soaked stand -staring at the blank sky, looking for the ravens to come and peck her eyes -Dumbledore might allow himself an act of mercy. Closing her eyelids, he would place two silver coins on her closed eyes. For Acheron on his raft of logs, to carry her to the other side of the river Styx.  
  
"Minerva," he said. "Please accompany Miss Granger back to Gryffindor Tower. I trust you to make sure there is a bed for her in the seventh years' girls' dormitory."  
  
  


* * *

  
  
Moonbeams slanted through the archers' slits lining the wall of the corridor she and her Head of House walked. Professor McGonagall's low, sensible heels were knocking against the flagstones. They set a cranky rhythm, which bore pinprick echoes into the castle's ancient walls. McGonagall's avian, once pretty face was set in determination; clear lines of anger and sorrow carved into it.  
  
Hermione, walking at her side was determined to keep a façade of calm resolve. For a moment, she wished for billowing robes - similarly fashioned to Professor MacGonagall's tartan ones - to fly all around her in her fury. Robes that would engulf and hide her, the way Snape used to conceal himself behind the loose cut of his robes. She flinched at the notion, never allowing the thick lump of memories stuck in her throat to slow her step. _This will not do, Granger. You are stronger than that_.  
  
"We should stop at my- former room," she made herself say, realizing they were drawing nearer to the Head Girl's room. "I need to fetch my familiar. He may not be there at this time of the night, but I should check for him anyway. Besides, there are several things I need for the night as well."  
  
Professor MacGonagall nodded.  
  
Crook, as was to be expected, was missing at this time of the night; probably out pestering the castle's rodents. Alarmed to have her eyes suddenly dry, she scanned the room. It had been pale and estranged in the moonlight. Behind her, she could hear her Head of House clear her throat.  
  
The Transfiguration Professor had no way of knowing that Hermione's eyes were scorched and dry. Had no way of knowing that the familiar emptiness was nipping at her student's heels, she thought bitterly. The man she loved was disgraced and would be departing: it was bound to be greying, now wasn't it?  
  
"May I remind you that I should be escorting you back to Gryffindor Tower?" The Deputy Headmistress made her impatience clear.  
  
"There will be no need, Professor."  
  
Efficient as ever, Hermione gathered several items she deemed necessary, and shrinking each one, put them into her schoolbag. Then, with the utmost reverence, she turned to her nightstand where the leather-covered volume Snape had given her rested, and gently lifted the tome. First he trusted her with this book, then he trusted her with his body, then he trusted her with his heart. What a strange, fey creature. _Doesn't the legend say that whoever is trapped in the fairies' realms is bound to spend there one-hundred years before they can return to the human world-?_ she was suddenly reminded of the tale. _Back home they discovered all their loved ones are gone and the world they knew is no longer. I think it might be the same for me, Snape. The world I knew before I fell in love with you doesn't exist anymore. Only in my dreams_.  
  
And he loved her, which was, really, all that mattered.  
  
MacGonagall, who didn't spend her time in the fairies' realms and was therefore broken-hearted at her supposed betrayal by Snape and Hermione, walked the girl out of her former Head Girl's room. She escorted Hermione into the Gryffindor common room, following her through the portrait hole.  
  
Three out of the seven Gryffindors who stayed for the Christmas holiday were apparently awake, and down in the common room. All three of them were obviously surprised to see their Head Girl accompanied into the common room by no other than Professor Minerva MacGonagall.  
  
The sharp, not unpleasant face of the Gryffindor's Head of House bore an acute expression. One reserved for the lewdest of rule breakers, usually Slytherins, and never, ever for the Gryffindor's own Head Girl. The common room's occupants, Neville Longbottom amongst them, were immediately alarmed.  
  
"I will follow you upstairs, where I will conjure an extra bed for you," the Transfiguration Mistress told her coolly, in a neutral voice that carried MacGonagall's words across the room. "Then you can go to sleep."  
  
Hermione nodded, unable to stop her cheeks from flushing. She had no intention of going to sleep, but her Professor had no way of knowing that.  
  
Once inside the dormitory, she was instantly washed with unpleasant memories: Patil and Brown teasing her about her hair and teeth, "Really, Hermione, what normal boy would ever want to date a beaver-" mocking her bookishness, her taste in clothing, insulting her Muggle heritage, her smell, her obsessive neatness, giggling; talking about boys in the dark, about what they did and what they would like to do, and who would ever pay attention to this ugly duck of a girl they were forced to share their room with: why, they were practically joyous when she left to have her own room. _So she slept with Snape?_ She could imagine the two of them whispering in hushed voices; carefully intonated for her to hear them. _No surprise, they were practically made for each other, Granger and the greasy git_.  
  
And still, inside her there was only dust.  
  
She watched Professor MacGonagall conjuring an extra bed, cold and impersonal as she told Hermione goodnight and turned to leave the room. _Harry was right_ , Hermione mused. _We are so fucked up_.  
  
Waiting several moments until she was sure the Gryffindor Head of House could no longer be found in the common room, Hermione descended downstairs, unsurprised to have three pairs of eyes probing her with curiosity. It was never her custom to provide people with information concerning her private affairs, and she didn't find it necessary to establish a new habit.  
  
Her hands crossed in her lap, she sank into an armchair in front of the fire, and ignoring Neville's truly concerned attempts to make conversation, stared into the swirling flames. Harry would arrive sooner or later, and then perhaps- she could not put her finger on it, but something about Harry was acutely relevant. It was gravely important that if she could not be with Snape, she should at least talk to Harry. Harry would make it somehow better- or else she would have to enlarge that razor she put in her schoolbag just in case, and use it on her wrist.  
  
  


* * *

  
  
"Hermione- wake up."  
  
Blinking, she opened her eyes. The red light spread by the embers still burning in the fireplace trickled down Harry's cheek. Mixing with the creamy whiteness of his skin, it imparted a damp, rosy hue to his face.  
  
She yawned, drifting into a painful awakening as the night's events fixed themselves more firmly into her memory. "I've been waiting for you," she whispered, her voice bearing an accusatory note.  
  
"What happened?" Harry asked worriedly. She could see he was tired - eyelids threatening to droop - and yet, he looked at her, demanding to know if everything was all right.  
  
Hermione pinched the bridge of her nose. "You should sit."  
  
Too tired to object, Harry dropped into a couch at her side, limbs sprawled in complete abandon and his head hanging to the left so he could look at her. "Tell me what happened."  
  
She moistened her lips, grateful for the darkness, for hiding the strain written all over her face. "We were caught," she somehow managed, fingers digging into the armrests.  
  
"Holy hell." Harry held his breath. "And?"  
  
"I was stripped of my Head Girl's badge," she continued. "And confined to the common room and dormitories until I'm graduated. Snape was sacked. He's gone, Harry-" uttering these words, her voice suddenly failed her, as if her throat had been lacerated. Taking a deep breath, Hermione made herself move on. "I am back to my old dormitory, with Patil and Brown- I have no idea what to do about Ron. I planned to tell him in due time: now it's both too soon, and if he doesn't hear the story from me first-" her fingers trembled on the armrests. Nonetheless, now that the conversation topic was relatively safe, she no longer felt the urge to slash and tear burning her insides.  
  
"We'll take care of Ron," Harry reassured her. "And even if the gossipers reach him first, he's not the one I'm worried about. What's with you, Hermione? How do _you_ feel?"  
  
 _The moles, the moles_ , she wanted to tell him. _Don't bring in the moles. Don't coil the wire_. But he did, and her eyes were no longer dry as she'd thought them to be. "He's g-gone, Harry," she choked, her voice shaking. "They took him a- a-away from m-me."  
  
"I know," he murmured, moving at the couch, to kneel at her feet. "I know, pet."  
  
Reaching his hand, Harry wiped off a tear that rolled down her cheek, then another, stuffing a lock of wild hair behind her ear. "Come here, Hermione," he murmured, gently taking her hand and helping her down to the carpet. "Come, it will be all right, I promise. We'll make it all right."  
  
Harry didn't attempt to hug her, nor did he do anything but wipe away her tears and clear unruly locks from her face. All he did was whisper nonsensical, winsome promises, which sounded like music to her dizzy, teary-eyed self, and allow his body heat to diffuse; wrapping around her along with the slowly vanishing heat coming from the hearth.  
  
Morning found them facing each other, asleep in front of the renewed fire.  
  
  


* * *

  
  
The Head Girl's affair with the Slytherin Head of House was the juiciest piece of meat that had fallen into the beaks of the corpse-eaters ever since the alarming news of the DADA's Professor being a werewolf. And as the term began, they feasted.  
  
She was excluded. The school's walking joke.  
  
Shunned by her housemates, who had - immediately upon revealing the cause of her dismissal - omitted her from their lot, as if she was the rotten apple in a basket full of fresh, fragrant fruits.  
  
Shunned by the Hufflepuffs, who traditionally followed the Gryffindors' moral lead.  
  
Shunned and looked down at by the Ravenclaws, after always being a thorn in their side; pretentious lioness that she was, now fallen from her pedestal. They were Ravenclaws after all, and didn't hesitate to persiflage.  
  
Only the Slytherins, the beaten, decapitated Slytherins, led by Draco Malfoy, kept their own counsel.  
  
And sweet, loving Ron, who narrowed his eyes and washed his hands clean of her. Deprived of any hope of privacy now that she was confined to the common room and the seventh year girls' dormitory, with a metaphorical wooden stake rammed into her heart, she watched Ron turn his back, and spitefully - _oh, it must have been spitefully, you could always be so cruel when you wanted_ \- walk out of the Gryffindor common room.  
  
Two sixth year' girls -one of them she had once caught breaking serious school rules and had severely punished -giggled from the corner. Hermione turned on her heels, ready to deduct points, then remembered she no longer had such authority. _Ron, you fuck. Couldn't you at least hold this conversation private? No, you wanted me humiliated. The way I humiliated you, preferring the vile Potions Master over yourself_.  
  
With tears prickling her eyes, and the high, silvery giggle of the girls knocking like church bells in her head, she climbed the stairs to the seventh year girls' dormitory two at a time. Slamming the door behind her, she leaned against the sturdy, cool surface, only to discover Patil was sitting on her bed, spreading pink nail polish on her toenails.  
  
The tanned girl tightened her lips at the noise, obviously angry to be interrupted in such a crude way. But just like the other Gryffindors, she would not say a thing to the former Head Girl who disgraced them.  
  
It was just like her first year at Hogwarts. _No_ , she thought. _It was worse_. Because now that she tasted the sweet favour of acceptance; having this taken from her - after her social muscles grew complacent with it - was the most horrible form of torture. And she was falling, crawling on her hands and knees, the grainy dust cutting into her skin. She was not fit for this desert, with her flesh literally reeking with water. All the small desert creatures - rodents and insects and even plants - would come feasting on her corpse once she died. So quivering with water she was.  
  
And the worst; she missed him. He was stuck like a bone in her throat; trapped in the soft tissues draping her larynx. Its sharp ends cut into the moistened flesh and stabbed into her spinal cord. _Hundreds of years from now_ , she mused, _when scientists find my skeleton, this bone will still be there. And when they come to catalogue me, they'll name me "The Girl with the Snape in Her Throat". Funny, right, Snape? I knew it would make you chuckle_. Missed him: so hard, that sometimes she thought that the legendary silver thread connecting lovers to each other - connecting her to Snape - was torn, and it was the blood of her heart, streaming from her aorta, which kept her eyes wet. Though there were no tears.  
  
Tired of pretending to be strong, sick from hearing Brown and Patil whispering behind her back while she was attempting to study, Hermione had angrily closed the draperies around her bed and cast a strong silencing charm. Crookshanks, all the while drowsing in her lap, jumped in alarm.  
  
"Shut up," she muttered, a tear trickling down her cheek.  
  
The half-Kneazle yawned, and sensing his mistress' distress, was now concaving his triangular head into her palm. _'Come on, now,'_ purred the tom. _'It's only a male. You know what males are like. All thinking with their belly.'_  
  
She stifled a laugh, scratching Crookshanks' head. "That's what all tomcats off-season are like."  
  
 _'Well, you know,'_ the cat tried a different tactic. _'There are lots of mice in the burrow.'_  
  
"But there is only one mouse for me."  
  
 _'Humans.'_ Crook's whiskers vibrated with distaste as he once again climbed into her lap.  
  
Putting the cat aside - to the tom's explicit annoyance - Hermione stretched on the bed. Great, she thought. Not only she was the school's joke, slowly consumed by longing, she was once again having imaginary conversations with her familiar.  
  
Crookshanks growled. _'No one else is talking to you, beside the four-eyed git,'_ he reminded her. _'I'd say you should be grateful to me, risking my reputation like that.'_  
  
"I'd say you can stuff it." Turning her back to the half-Kneazle, she buried her face in the pillows, willing the tears to come. They didn't; she knew they wouldn't, and yet, biting on the soft linen, she prayed the nothingness would come to an end. At least tonight. It wouldn't; the way it didn't reach its peak the previous night, or on the night before.  
  
  


* * *

  
  
It had been a week since the beginning of the term and she felt so hollow that she began to wonder whether it was the consumed mass of her soul that vacuumed her further in. _Black hole of a human_. When a letter from Donna landed in her breakfast once again, Hermione was too exhausted to remove it. Bored, she merely watched the wetness of her fruit salad staining the expensive paper.  
  
At last, it was Harry who reached for the letter.  
  
"It's from your parents," he told her quietly.  
  
"Yes," she murmured. "They have been informed and my mother is all riled up."  
  
Harry's doll-like face was set in a serious expression. Some other day, she supposed, it would have unsettled her. Today, it merely made her blink. He was too good, too dedicated. His loyalty was a burden. Didn't he see she could not return the favour in her state? That she could never be grateful enough, and therefore, thankful at all, for his sticking with her? Ron was his first and best friend, and now she was the cause for their animosity. She sometimes wondered whether having one's moral choices so clear made life harder or easier. She still didn't know, but in her current state of mind, tended to go for the previous.  
  
"Hermione," Harry pleaded with her, disturbing her line of thoughts and anchoring her back to reality. "I think you should open this letter."  
  
"You open it," she answered, shrugging her shoulders. "I couldn't care less."  
  
"You're not being yourself lately." His voice was low but intense. "Come," he said. "Gryffindor table isn't the place to discuss this, and I think we should talk."  
  
Tiredly, she rose to her feet, doing her best to ignore the gnawing sensation that everyone was staring at her. The chair in which she had been sitting stuck when she tried to pull it back to place. A leg got caught between two flagstones and the noise drew several scrutinizing eyes. Tightening her lips, she shook the chair a little, beads of sweat rolling down her forehead as it squeaked, then finally slid into place.  
  
"Coming?" Harry, at her side, was giving her a worried look.  
  
She nodded.  
  
Perspiration was spurting from her armpits; moistening the underside of her breasts; making her hands damp and her clothes sweaty and clingy. She could feel the curious, accusatory, aggravated looks gluing to her form, mixing with her sweat. A certain part of her being was rapidly shrinking confronted with the stares, growing smaller and smaller and smaller until there was nothing left to see. Her motions had suddenly become awkward: moving became difficult task, as if the part of her frontal lobe responsible for coordinating her of movements had stopped functioning properly. Her legs grew limp - so limp she feared she might stumble and dislocate an ankle. She was about to stumble and dislocate an ankle-  
  
"Hi, Potter!" a tall, sixth year Ravenclaw was nodding toward them, blocking the hallway. "Aren't you afraid of messing with Snape's toy-thing? The greasy git can be quite dangerous."  
  
Harry - Donna's letter still clutched in his hand - stopped at once, looking as if he had been bitten by a snake. Stuffing the letter into a pocket of his robe, he turned to face the Ravenclaw. "Care to repeat that?"  
  
The Ravenclaw, whom Hermione recognized as Thayne Waverly - a pureblood from one of the minor pureblood families - crossed his hands over his chest. "I asked," he repeated, "If you're not afraid to mess with Snape's _Mudblood_ toy."  
  
Harry's eyes flashed. Within an instant, Harry's, Hermione's and Waverly's wands were all drawn, ready to strike. It was not Harry or Hermione's curse, however, which hit the sixth year boy with a flash of silver sparks.  
  
"You show respect for my Head of House," a familiar drawl ordered; blond head tilting over the writhing and frothing Waverly. "Crab, Goyle, take this shit to Madam Pomfrey."  
  
In his mastered amusement, Draco Malfoy reminded Hermione of Harry's snowy white owl, Hedwig. Draco and Hedwig were both bright; both beautiful; and under their almost heart-breaking beauty; they were both predators.  
  
Once he checked the hallway was clear, Hermione expected Malfoy's first reaction to be some scathing remark. Instead, she saw him reaching to grab Harry's collar, and nailing the other boy to the wall, he drew him into a long, desperate kiss. She was not surprised to hear her long-time friend mewling and burying his head in Malfoy's hair: she was surprised, though, to see Draco closing his eyes, his fingers trailing over Harry's cheekbone as if Harry was the one most precious thing in the entire world.  
  
Watching them with her dimming, greying irises, she was somehow filled and somehow hollowed by the knowledge of their love; imprinted onto her cognition. The tears prevented Michael Strogov from going blind, but she had no tears to prevent her from blinding by the iron-white blaze of the sword passing in front of her eyes. _What a cruel, cruel world_.  
  
Upon breaking off, Draco was the first to look at her.  
  
She merely lifted her brow. "Not very discreet," she noted.  
  
"Said the mistress of evasion."  
  
She nodded. "Point taken."  
  
Harry, back at her side, was clearly having troubles guarding his gaze. "Hermione's right. You should go now."  
  
A muscle along Malfoy beautifully defined cheekbone twitched. Like a cat baring his canine teeth. Three seconds later he was gone, leaving Harry and Hermione all by themselves.  
  
Harry sighed. "The letter."  
  
She gave him a quizzical look. "Now you are evading me."  
  
"Not much to say."  
  
"He loves you."  
  
Something in the boy's eyes lit up. "You think?"  
  
"He touches you as if you were made of china."  
  
Harry blinked. "Now, the letter."  
  
"Fuck the letter."  
  
"I never heard you talking like that."  
  
To Harry's utter surprise, she threw back her head and burst into laughter, every fiber of her being shaking with it.  
  
"What's so funny?"  
  
"Nothing, nothing," she said. "Just give me the letter, I'll read it, then we can burn it."  
  
Both relieved and worried over his friend's sudden agreement, Harry pulled the letter out of his pocket and handed it to Hermione.  
  
Disgusted at the blots staining the envelope, she opened it with the tips of her fingers, pulling the slightly wet paper laying inside it and shaking it open.  
  
 _"Hermione Jane,"_ she began reading aloud, for Harry to hear as well.  
  
 _"Being informed about your latest affairs, your father and I are practically speechless. I am lacking the words to describe the enormity of my disappointment-"_ at that, Hermione rolled her eyes. "This is the part of the letter in which she'll tell me how gravely ashamed she is of me, what a disgrace of a daughter I am, how I nearly caused my father a heart attack, what would the neighbours say, and why, oh why, didn't I come talk to her about my problems. On to next part of the letter."  
  
 _"Taking into consideration the poor supervision Hogwarts seems to provide its students, as well as the troubles you were experiencing, your father and I have decided it would be best for you to come home--"_ her lips were already rounded to give form and shape to the next couple of words, but her voice - her voice seemed to fail her.  
  
"Hermione-" Harry asked, gently tapping her shoulder. "Hermione? Hermione!"  
  
"I-am-not-going-home," she told him, her lower lip trembling. "There is no way -no way -I am going home."  
  
He moistened his lips, blinking. "We could tell Dumbledore-" Harry stuttered. "Surely if he didnג't transfer you, he wants you here; he knows you're important for the fight-"  
  
Hermione shook her head. "Don't you see, Harry-? I'm not quite an adult- Not even great Dumbledore himself can prevent them from retrieving me if they want to. They can do whatever they want- bloody youth-"  
  
"Shit." he worried his lower lip. "But why are we standing in the hallway? I meant for us to go to this unused classroom that I know of. Come, Hermione," he ordered her, tugging the sleeve of her school robe. "It's not far and no one can overhear us there."  
  
Lumbering behind him, she let herself be dragged, her peripheral vision blurring then refocusing once Harry closed and warded a heavy oaken door behind them.  
  
"Any idea when they're coming to get you?" he asked her immediately after casting a strong silencing charm on the room.  
  
 _Dirty_ , she thought. The ancient classroom was _dirty_ , with cobwebs hanging from the low ceilings and tiny, crawling creatures that might climb over her body and gnaw their way in. Just being inside, allowing the stagnant, mouldy air into her lungs made her feel defiled. _You brought me a pure, white hand to remind me I that I am already clean, Snape, but don't you know you were the reason that for once in my life I didn't feel contaminated?_ Fighting a gale of nausea and memories, she offered the letter to Harry, watching him read briefly through the lines.  
  
"Tomorrow," he said at last. "Your Mum seems to be in a hurry. Any idea why she wouldn't send this letter earlier, then? They were probably informed on the spot."  
  
Hermione swallowed. "My father wanted me home at Christmas. He made it clear in the note attached to their Christmas present. He believes that I should be with them if I'm having any kind of troubles. Mother is rather fond of having a remote controlled daughter. I suppose it took him a while to convince her that I should be brought home."  
  
Harry ran a hand through his unruly hair, the fingers of his other the hand - the one holding the letter - pressing into the expensive, _stained_ sheet. "What will you do?"  
  
Hermione closed her eyes, settling her breath- _Oxygen is the most vital nutrient for our bodies_ , she repeated voicelessly. _It is essential for the integrity of the brain, nerves, glands and internal organs-_ "What shall I do - it is clear that I cannot stay in Hogwarts for them to retrieve me. Nor will I enter a legal front with them over my keep. Mine is a scanty case, and it would only cause my parents sorrow and humiliation - which was never my intention to begin with." Her lips tightened. "I must take off, Harry, there is no avoiding it - if only I knew where Snape is-"  
  
"Perhaps I could ask questions for you after you're gone," Harry said impatiently. "At the moment the question is how we get you out."  
  
"The Shrieking Shack," she answered simply. "We can walk to the Womping Willow in your invisibility cloak, or you could lend me the cloak and I'd leave it just near the entrance. From Hogsmeade I Floo to Diagon Alley, then I'm in London."  
  
Harry shook his head. "Are you crazy? You'll be caught in an instant!"  
  
She swallowed, looking for Harry's eyes behind the large, ridiculous spectacles. "That's might be true, but not if I have a Secret Keeper."  
  
  


* * *

  
  
Looking for the details of the Fidelius Charm was somewhat challenging, especially taking into consideration her permitted range was limited from the start. Harry and Harry's invisibility cloak, so it seemed, both came as great assets; carrying books straight from the library's restricted section in full daylight.  
  
Since Harry had no access to Hermione's dormitory, and she was confined to Gryffindor Tower, the two made use of the empty room off the Northern Tower, where Harry and Draco sometimes spent nights together. Getting there was easy: Hermione sneaked to the place under Harry's cloak. She left the vast, circular room in the same manner.  
  
Quickly enough, she had turned the two boys' refugee into a temporary studying area, with even Crookshanks having agreed to sit quietly in Harry's arms while the bespectacled boy carried him there. Both of them knew that people weren't likely to pay attention to her disappearance. In the common room it would be assumed she was in her dormitory, while Brown and Patil were hardly ever there before curfew, to report otherwise. The two would be too busy chasing boys, hanging around with the other girls or otherwise immersed in their own businesses, to notice their roommate was missing. _And to think I'd ever find it to be a blessing-_  
  
Hermione was least surprised to realize the Fidelius Charm was Runes, blood magic. Like most of the strongest, oldest forms of magic, it didn't involve a wand, only fierce intention, a blade and the knowledge of Runes. Not having taken Ancient Runes, Harry's knowledge of the subject had been sparse. As a result, Hermione had spent several afternoons lecturing to her friend, showing and explaining the usage Runes. Thorough as ever, she made sure he understood the theory behind the charm and could properly draw the Runes involved in it. First on paper and then with a blade Hermione had dislodged from a single-use shaving razor; over some leather items Harry had transfigured.  
  
Not unexpectedly, Harry had been tense all afternoon and evening. When he told her he was going for a walk, Hermione did not object. Instead, she used her time alone to put her scant property and bustling thoughts into some semblance of order. She was being harsh indeed, but there were several reasons this plan might be least of all possible evils. Staying at her parents' house never occurred to her. The place held too many hidden stains, like a secret script, written on a clean parchment with lemon juice and only discovered once put over the fire. She loved both of her parents, had her issues with both of them, and knew that living with them was bound to madden her. Staying in Hogwarts was no longer an option. Her parents wouldn't send her to another wizarding school either. Nor would they send her to another boarding school.  
  
Fleeing, it seemed, was the only path still open to her. Running away from the Wizarding World she would be bound to live without her wand, seeing any under age witch or wizard was forbidden to use magic outside Hogwarts. Unless she used a Secret Keeper. Which would prevent the Ministry - as well as any other magician wishing to find her - from detecting the source of her magic and tracking it through a registered wand. That is, assuming they had access to the Wands' Registry. Most important, she knew, having a Secret Keeper would prevent her from being detected; by Dumbledore, the Ministry of Magic, or even Scotland Yard.  
  
She still had some Muggle and some Wizarding money, and had accepted the prospect of being forced to use magic to wind her way back into the Muggle World. Yes, she might be young, but she knew she could make it. _Technically_.  
  
Get a job. Earn her living. Float above the surface. Until the ropes binding her cognition to reality snapped, and she flew- high, high- like Snape's feathered cloak, without a power shield to trap her; until she became one with the moonlight.  
  
Sighing she looked at her hands. Already red and sore from scraping. _If I run, will I ever see you again? I know I'm going to be back in about June, hopefully in time for the final battle, but will you? Are you still spying for Dumbledore, now that the Headmaster sacked you, or are you your own man, now? Where are you, Snape? Did you ever try to contact me? Surely Dumbledore wouldn't let you-? Did you really mean it when you said you loved me? I should stop it, and soon_ , she decided. _Before I become a doormat_.  
  
She was so immersed in her thoughts that she failed hear the door swing open. The loud squeak of hinges that weren't properly oiled was followed by soft footsteps, and the tall, feline figure of Draco Malfoy.  
  
"Granger."  
  
Nearly dropping the book she had forgotten to read, Hermione leaped to her feet. "What are _you_ doing here?"  
  
Beside Draco, Harry was removing the hood of his invisibility cloak. "He's with me," he said, pale face and thin form incarnated out of moving shadows. "Draco knows where Snape is, and can get you there."  
  
Her blood suddenly humming with yearning, she turned to look at Malfoy. "Where is he?"  
  
Frowning, Draco reached to remove a massive, expertly intricate gold band from his third finger. "He's at the Manor. Father wrote to me yesterday. Snape has been staying there since last week." Malfoy rolled the ring between his thumb and index finger. "I won't lie to you, Granger. I'm not doing this for your Muggle born self, and I'm not doing this for Snape, though I respect my Head of House-"  
  
 _Not former Head of House_ , she noted proudly, _but his Head of House_.  
  
"Something amuses you?" he asked.  
  
"You were supposed to say: my former Head of House."  
  
At that, Draco Malfoy approached her, leaning close enough for Hermione to see her reflection in his lucid, grey eyes. She thought she could smell mint, lemon and pine; cool, airy scent that drifted along the blurry ends of her awareness.  
  
"Here's something you noble Gryffindors can still learn from us corrupted Slytherins," drawled Malfoy, his eyes gleaming dangerously. "No Slytherin is below their Slytherin fellows' notice. Not even a fallen one."  
  
Resuming his place beside Harry, he continued; "so now, as I was saying, I am not doing this for you, or for my Head of House. I am doing this for Harry. And I'm asking something in return. I need information."  
  
She nodded. "I respect that. It seems like a fair bargain. What information do you seek?"  
  
Draco seemed struck at her words. _Never expected to hear that from a Gryffindor, now did you?_ She thought. _So let me surprise you, ferret. Some of us are able to know thy enemy, for his flaws, as well as his merits. Moreover, we are able to pay him the respect he deserves_.  
  
"My father isn't satisfied with Snape's version of your affair," Malfoy said at last. "I'm not asking you to get into details-" he hushed her before she might have given him a heated answer. "The only thing I need to know is what you mean to Snape. This ring," he continued, "is charmed to act as a Portkey. It would take you past the anti-Apparition shields on the Malfoy Manor, past the wards, and straight to the front lawn. And may I add that merely locating the Manor would be impossible otherwise, not to mention breaking into it."  
  
Watching the dim light of the candles reflecting off the golden band, she knew Draco's price was too high. Not only would she betray Snape's trust, she would practically hand him over to Malfoy Sr. But before she could try to convince Draco she's nothing but a deeply in love schoolgirl fooling herself to think her vile teacher bears some kind of twisted affection towards her - any other answer, she knew, would reveal the true nature of Snape's feelings - Harry burst into their conversation.  
  
"Draco, you can't!" The Boy Who Lived to Save the Day was shaking his boyfriend desperately. "I thought Professor Snape was one of your own-!"  
  
Malfoy's face softened as he turned to look at Harry. "We're spying on everyone," he said gently, stroking the other boy's cheek. "Knowledge is power. Do you really think my father fights for the Dark Lord?" Draco whispered. "He fights for the House of Malfoy."  
  
This statement had a devastating affect on Harry, whose shoulders slumped in silent defeat. "Yes," she heard him say, watching the shorter boy instinctively withdrawing. "Your father fights for the House of Malfoy, in which half-blood Harry Potter has no place."  
  
"Screw you, Potter!" Draco yelled angrily, reaching for Hermione's hand. Opening her palm, he stuffed the ring inside, and gritting his teeth, closed her fingers around it. "Here, Granger. Take the damn ring; the words to activate it are 'Oderint dum metuant'. I hope you and Snape are fucking happy together."  
  
She acknowledged the gesture. "Thank you," she murmured, intentionally tinting her voice with a note of amusement. The note of desperation in Draco's voice was a rather clear indication that no letter would be sent to Lucius Malfoy; no letter containing information Harry would not want it to contain. Nevertheless, Hermione was still careful to mask her feelings in Draco's presence.  
  
Stumbling to the wall, Malfoy closed his eyes, and allowed himself to crumple. "Donג't thank _me_ , Mudblood. Thank Harry."  
  
Hermione angled a brow. Years of being taunted about her Muggle heritage did little to abate the sting. "I need the Portkey," she told him, "so I won't share my estimation of your character with you. However, seeing my best friend seems to be strangely fond of your shitty self, I deem it necessary to warn you that if you ever hurt him, I'll hex you into next Tuesday. Is that clear?"  
  
Draco nodded.  
  
"I'm glad you see reason," she said. "Now, Harry-"  
  
The smaller boy was currently occupying a battered couch at the other end of the room; quietly staring at the front of his worn-out trainers. "Yeah?"  
  
"I believe we still have several things to do," she told him as he lifted his green eyes to look at her. "I don't know if Draco should be here-"  
  
Malfoy let out a snort. "Why, Granger, don't you trust me you with your secrets?"  
  
"I don't even trust you with my spent quills. Now the door is that way," she pointed with her wand.  
  
"Right." Malfoy moved to his feet, lumbering towards the door. Harry rose to escort him.  
  
She turned her back to them, allowing the couple a moment of privacy. A minute or two later, when Harry tapped her shoulders, there were tears in his eyes, but he seemed stronger somehow. She remembered not all tears were of sorrow.


	24. Malfoy Manor

and now you are and i am now and we're  
a mystery which will never happen again,  
a miracle which has never happened before  
and shining this our now must come to then

our then shall be some darkness during which  
fingers are without hands;and i have no  
you;and all trees are(any more than each  
leafless)its silent in forevering snow

\--but never fear(my own,my beautiful  
my blossoming)for also then's until

\--" now all the fingers of this tree "

\-- e.e.cummings

Snape stepped out of an unused fireplace in the Hall of Malfoy Manor, relieved that the wards on the Floo still recognized him. The fireplace had long been swept clean, the Manor's Floo connection to the wizarding world. Not even a faint drifting of soot mussed Snape's black clothing and Hogwarts teaching robe. He looked down at himself, standing with his two bags, and thought he should probably remove the teaching robe. It was his no longer, really. He set his bags down and was removing the robe when a thin, high voice piped from behind him.

"Who is arriving this time of the morning?"

Snape turned to find one of the Malfoy house elves looking up at him. "Tell your master that Severus Snape is here to ask a favor of him."

It wasn't long before Snape heard soft footsteps descending the stone staircase off to the side of the Hall. He turned, to see Lucius padding downstairs slowly in a rich velvet dressing gown of deepest blue, running his hand through his shoulder-length blond hair and over his sleepy face. He needed a shave, but it was hardly noticeable, his hair was so very fair. In the early morning light through the windows, the beard gave him a nimbus about the face, and his hair a golden aureole. Angelic, as always, Lucius Malfoy. As was his wife, Narcissa, who looked enough like Lucius to be his twin. Snape recalled that Lucius had always liked mirrors; it almost seemed he had married his reflection.

"Severus," he said, standing a bit apart, his hands in his robe pockets, his bare legs in a wide stance, soft slippers that matched his dressing gown on his feet. Lucius had never been one to shake hands upon greeting an old friend, which suited Snape just fine. "What brings you here, this New Year's dawn? Narcissa and I have not been home long, ourselves."

"It's a very long story," said Snape, "and not a pleasant one. If I could trouble you for a bed, and a bath, and a little food. Not necessarily in that order."

Lucius snapped his fingers. "Hobnail," he said, to the bat-eared elf that appeared as if from nowhere. "Some breakfast for Professor Snape. Bring it into the morning room. Have these bags taken up to the Slytherin room. And bring us coffee."

"Hobnail is going, sir, to fetch," squeaked the elf, backing, bowing, wringing his hands, and then vanishing.

"I see your elves are still well trained," said Snape dryly.

"I believe in obedience. Come, through here. You look tired, Severus."

"I am. I've not slept this night."

"Celebrating the new year a bit too strenuously, my friend?"

"You might say that."

Lucius pushed open the door to the morning room. The draperies were open, and the sky outside was pale, edging the clouds with silver, nearly the color of Lucius' eyes. "Do tell," he said. "And sit." He motioned to a small armchair.

Snape sat. He folded his hands on his lap. "There's not an easy way to say this, so I'll just say it. Lucius, I've been sacked."

"Great Merlin. Where's the Jameson's?" Lucius began to snap his fingers and call an elf, but Snape shook his head.

"No, thank you. Food first. Lucius. I...was caught sleeping with one of my students. Dumbledore had no choice."

"Do tell," said Lucius again, silkily. He looked wide awake now, his grey eyes gleaming with curiosity. "It sounds delicious, and quite unlike you. And let me guess, my old friend...another tragic Gryffindor romance? Boy, or girl?"

At that moment breakfast arrived. Snape had his choice of a rich porridge, yellow with thick cream, or peeled and sliced fruit. Instead of choosing, he spooned some of the fruit over the cereal and began to eat hungrily. Hermione: "You need more protein, Snape." Not this morning; he could not have stomached meat.

Lucius stole his fork, and fished some pale green melon from the bowl. He nibbled it slowly, the blue of his gown making his eyes clear, like still water. "Do tell," he prompted.

"I had forgotten how that phrase of yours annoys me," said Snape. "Very well, I will tell. Yes, Gryffindor, and girl."

"Age?"

"Not adult, let's say."

Lucius emitted a chuckle very like his son's. "How interesting, how young, and how shameful, Severus."

"Exactly." Snape continued eating quickly, before Lucius' comments took away the last of his already waning appetite. But Hermione thought him too thin, so he would eat.

Lucius poured them both coffee. Snape drank it while it was too hot, but it felt good, scalding down his throat. It felt clean, which reminded him of Hermione. If he concentrated, he could still smell her on his skin.

"Tell me more, Severus. What kind of affair? How long were you able to keep it a secret? Was it delicious? Who discovered you? You'd think, after everything you went through with Lily that you'd be through falling in love with Gryffindors. Or sleeping with them, however it was. They're not predictable, like Slytherin women. Far too...irrational." He looked at his nails critically. "Though I've heard they're very loyal to their mates."

Snape's eyebrow rose. He well knew Lucius' views on Muggle-born witches, and had no intention of sharing Hermione's name with him. "I realize I once told you all about Lily, and what she meant to me, and how much I hated James Potter. But what I've told you now is as far as it goes, Lucius. I slept with a Gryffindor student, was caught, and sacked. I need a place to stay for a week or two while I figure out what to do next. I'd like that place to be here, with you, where it's comfortable, with people I know. Plus I should catch up on Voldemort's doings -- I've been a bit preoccupied this term."

Lucius laughed. "Preoccupied. A nice term for a social crime, Severus. Certainly you must stay with us, I wouldn't have it any other way. I want to be there when you decide you want your young lover back." He leaned forward. "I'd like to see Dumbledore's face when you go to fetch her, that's what I'd like."

Snape frowned and pushed away his bowl. "That won't happen, Lucius. She's better off without me, I'm well over twice her age. She needs her education, not her ragged old Potions Master between her thighs."

"Mmm." The noise was noncommittal. Lucius' manicured fingers stroked the handle of his coffee cup. "Draco will tell me everything anyway, Severus."

"I can't stop him telling you what gossiping trash he hears -- and I'm sure it will be in this morning's owl post -- but I don't feel inclined to give you the gory details myself. Am I to be in my old room?"

"Of course. Top of the stairs, fourth room on the left in the East wing. I'll call you for luncheon, shall I? It will be rather late. Narcissa and I rang in the New Year in style with... friends last night."

"Death Eaters?"

"Who else would throw such a party? Of course, Death Eaters. We'll catch up on the past months tonight, over some Jameson's."

Snape staggered up the stairs and into the room where he'd stayed in the past. It was massive, and gloomy with the curtains drawn, the biggest bed he'd ever slept in, and the softest carpet on the floor. He left his boots outside the door for the elves to clean. He drew a bath, and after immersing himself briefly, knowing a moment's regret at washing Hermione's fragrance from his skin, crept into the cave of the curtained bed and slept the sleep of the exhausted.

The rushing sound of wind outside woke him much later. The sky was dark. Snape was shocked. He never slept more than a few hours in a single stretch, but he'd slept the day away. He dressed and wandered downstairs to find Lucius, and instead found Narcissa seated alone in the dining room, pushed back from the remains of her supper, nursing a snifter of brandy. She smiled as he entered the room.

"Severus, dear one. How long it has been." Snape bent over her hand, barely brushing it with his lips because she expected it. "I do hope you're more rested now. We've dined; Lucius wanted to wake you, but I said you needed the rest." Her eyes, pale blue and soulful, looked into his. "Lucius told me what happened." She gestured to an empty setting to her right. "Please. Join me. I hate to drink alone, and you must be hungry again."

Snape was indeed hungry. He filled his plate with vegetables, then, remembering Hermione, took a trout fillet as well. "Where is Lucius this evening?"

Narcissa slanted Snape a flirtatious glance. "Answering the post," she said. "Severus. Draco says you were sleeping with the Head Girl, Hermione Granger."

"Does he," growled Snape, lifting the spine and ribs from his fish and setting them aside. He had forgotten how wonderful the food always was at the Manor.

Narcissa went on chatting. "Yes -- and, apparently, you made the Daily Prophet as well. Dreadful rag, we don't take it here, but Draco sent us a clipping. Would you like to see it?"

"Narcissa, stop baiting me. Ask whatever questions you want to ask, and I'll decide if I want to answer them or not." He cut and speared several thin green beans with his fork and stuffed them rudely into his mouth. He felt like chewing at her, but he knew she would only laugh at him. She was a Slytherin to the bone, and understood him very well after the many long years.

She leaned forward now, and he could smell the brandy on her breath. "Why did you choose that particular girl?"

Snape leaned forward as well. Narcissa licked her lips, certain she would be given a precious nugget to squirrel away. "Because I could," he said. Then he laughed. "Why do you think? What did Draco tell you?"

She pouted. "Now you mock me." She took a large and unladylike swallow of her brandy, and set the glass down hard on the table.

"Of course I do. When have I not?"

"Draco has no idea why you chose her, a Gryffindor, and especially since you've never shown the slightest interest in any of your students."

"Dinner was lovely," he said, wiping his mouth and fingers on his napkin. "Thank you for keeping the dishes warm." He kissed her hand again, and left the room.

~*~

A couple of days later, it was Lucius' turn to torment him about Hermione. Snape had spent the intervening time plotting and planning what was next in his peculiar life, and trying to find time to speak to Lucius alone about Voldemort, but Narcissa seemed determined to involve herself in all their conversations. Snape had also been catching up on what felt like years of missed sleep. For some reason, not being at Hogwarts any longer, worrying over exploding cauldrons, or summons from Voldemort, or having to mark the many miles of punishment essays, had left him with time on his hands, and he was spending it in restful sleep. And, eating like a pig at the Malfoy's generous table. He could swear he felt himself thickening hour by hour, though his clothes fit him no differently.

His only problem with so much rest, and time on his hands: Hermione, who crept into all of his dreams, and tormented his free time with her dreaming dark eyes and red hands. On the fourth day of his visit, Snape borrowed a Malfoy falcon and sent a cryptic letter to Hermione, telling her where he was, after a fashion, and a reminder to be wary of her demon hand-washing. He had fears of what the stress of their discovery might be doing to her. It wasn't long before the falcon returned, flapping awkwardly onto his arm -- with his letter still attached, unopened. So Dumbledore has blocked our communication route, he thought. He would have to think of another way.

The three were sitting in the drawing room after dinner, Narcissa reading a Muggle novel, and Snape and Lucius working their way through glasses of Jameson's with the chess set between them.

"Tell me, is it true what they say -- that Muggle women..." Lucius paused wickedly, in mid-move with his knight.

"Muggle women...what, Lucius." Snape was tired of the baiting, but he needed a few more days to set his plans in order.

"Oh, never mind. I was just thinking about your little mudblood lover. I remember her. Large teeth. Didn't they make you anxious? What if you'd angered her, she could easily unman you, my friend, with teeth like those."

"If you'll set down that damned knight, I will take it with my bishop," growled Snape.

Lucius sighed. "Oh, Severus. Why won't you be drawn? I want so much to hear the details."

"Get them from Draco, since he appears to know so much about it."

"Her little pals aren't talking."

"Her little pals probably weren't told anything more than you," Snape pointed out. "Put the damned knight down."

"Not there, though..." said Lucius, chuckling.

Snape lowered his voice. "We need to talk, privately."

"Yes, we do. Tomorrow evening. Meet me here. I'll see that Narcissa is otherwise occupied."

~*~

The next night, instead of meeting Lucius, Snape found Narcissa in the drawing room. She turned from the fireplace, arms wrapped about her middle, and walked towards him, looking cold and anxious.

"Where is Lucius? I was to meet with him this evening."

"He's been called away."

"Where?"

Narcissa clutched the neck of her dress in her thin hand. "Voldemort summoned him."

"And not me," said Snape, unconsciously putting his hand over his Dark Mark.

"Voldemort has summoned Lucius alone several times this autumn and winter. Severus -- do you know why? It's worrisome, but Lucius won't tell me what it's been about."

Snape thought for a moment. "I think it must be about Draco," he mused. "Voldemort didn't like the information I was giving him from Hogwarts; it was never enough. He wanted more specifics, but I was never sure what about." About Potter, thought Snape. And who better to have specifics about Potter than Draco, his lover. Though how the Serpent Wizard knew about Draco and Potter he could not guess, unless Draco had told Lucius.

Narcissa turned sharply from him, back to the fire. He heard her draw shuddering breaths. "I think you must be right; Lucius has been very silent about the whole thing. And he's given Draco a portkey; something he never did before this year." She turned back to him. "What if Voldemort wants my son to take the Dark Mark?"

"I don't think it will come to that," said Snape, trying to sound reassuring. "At most, Voldemort wants a second perspective within Hogwarts." It wasn't only worrisome for the Malfoys. There had to be a reason why Voldemort had ceased to call Snape, and perhaps it was the correct one: Snape was a double agent, and if Voldemort had found out, it was the end of his utility as a spy, leaving him no cards to play. He needed to talk to Lucius, and soon.

~*~

As it happened, it was two days more before Snape could talk with Lucius. The summoning lasted more than a day, and when Lucius returned, he would speak to no one -- particularly Snape, pushing past the dark man on the stairs and walking silently and quickly to the suite he shared with Narcissa, where he closed the door behind him and Snape heard the sounds of powerful wards clicking into place.

Late the night of the second day, Snape was sitting alone in the Malfoys' drawing room, idly playing himself at wizard chess, and settling his plans. In another day or two he would shift himself to Angharad's cottage, it was the simplest and best solution. One of Hobnail's minions had offered Jameson's, but Snape shook his head. "Brandy," he said. No more whiskey for him for a while. It was too simple a solution. He didn't enjoy the sweetness of brandy the way he did the astringency of the whiskey, and was not so tempted to continue drowning in it. With Hermione gone from his life, he knew he would want the entire bottle of Jameson's if Lucius weren't there to keep an eye on the level in the bottle.

Years ago, along with the feathered cloak had come a will and testament, of sorts. Angharad's small stone cottage in Oxfordshire, the one he had shared with her during most of the eighteen months of his Druid training, belonged to him now. He had no idea of its current condition, but moving there seemed like a logical next step, once he was able to talk with Lucius and make additional plans where Voldemort was concerned.

"I'll take white and finish the game with you, Severus," said Lucius now, coming into the warm drawing room. He was dressed all in black, unusual for him, for black washed out the paleness of his coloring. Lucius was unbeautiful tonight.

Snape spun the board and Lucius settled in the armchair across from him.

"Tell me what happened with Voldemort, Lucius. You were gone for a long time."

"The man is fixated on Potter. I spent hours trapped in Legilimency with him draining every least thought I'd ever had about that wretched boy, and everything I'd ever heard." Lucius' clear eyes flicked up to meet Snape's. "And Voldemort is very angry with you. It seems you've not been responding to his summons lately. I myself have been wondering where you were. The meetings are even more excruciating without you there to exchange bitter commentary."

Snape tried to school his features. He moved a bishop out into the middle of the board, temptingly placed for Lucius to take with his queen if he felt reckless. "He has not been calling me. I've been...concerned about that."

"Not calling?" Lucius ignored the foolishly placed bishop and moved a knight into position to take a pawn in the next move. "Of course he's been calling you. But see here, Severus -- he feels he's been blocked from reaching you. There is some...white noise...between the two of you that has never been there before."

Now Snape's black head did come up and he stared directly at Lucius, thinking rapidly. "Since when?"

"Since the early autumn...perhaps mid-October. Severus, you've missed five meetings. With Voldemort just getting more and more angry. Are you telling me you never once felt the call?" His elegant hand touched the place on Snape's sleeve that covered the Dark Mark.

"Not once, since early October." Not since I was able to call down the Needfire, at the new moon, with Hermione in my Circle, that fierce, wonderful hawk of a girl. Prey sparrow no more.

Angharad: "In olden times, when there were still rituals performed that involved blood sacrifice, the power of the circle could be used to drive out demons. And build a wall of protection around the celebrants."

"For the duration of the ritual, yes, I could see that."

"Not only that, but afterwards as well. Lasting protection, Severus. It is the reason I still use my sickle, and the four drops of blood. Not a strong wall, such as would be created with an actual death, but sufficient for my purposes."

"What are your purposes, Angharad? Why do you need such protection?"

"I simply want not to be found, Severus. I like the quiet of my life."

It was an old buried memory of a discussion that he had discounted as fable. He hadn't believed that such temporary magic of the kind he saw raised at the rituals could last beyond the ritual itself, nor outside the confines of the Circle. Yet now...now, he must think.

"And Potter. Voldemort has been unable to see through Potter's eyes clearly for a couple of years, but now that same white noise that surrounds you, surrounds Potter as well. Voldemort is desperate to understand what Dumbledore has done to prevent his access to the boy."

"Hmm." Careful, Snape. Give nothing away. The lives of those children -- and your own worthless life -- depend upon your circumspection. Hermione must be teaching Potter the rituals. "And so we come to Draco, do we not, Lucius?"

At the mention of his son's name, Lucius went whiter still, if that were possible. He pulled back the cuff of his sleeve and looked at the Dark Mark that almost seemed to pulse there. "There was a time -- you remember it well, don't you, my friend? A time when this Mark of mine meant everything. A freedom like no other. But there came another time, Severus -- when Narcissa and I became a family, with our son's birth. And this Mark ceased to be primary in my life." His gaze met Snape's yet again. "Voldemort is desperate for another window into Hogwarts and Dumbledore's plans. My son is to be that window."

"And you would not choose this path for him." Snape moved the pawn out of reach of Lucius' knight.

"I would not." Lucius, distracted, took the bishop with his queen.

Snape quietly moved a hidden rook forward and took the queen. Lucius, in a fit of temper not directed at Snape at all, swept his arm across the chessboard, sending pieces flying everywhere, and then swept himself from the room.

Snape spent the rest of the evening in deep thought, sipping tea with lemon, instead of brandy. It was more important than ever that he reach Hermione, tell her of the new knowledge he had gained, and encourage her to extend the reach of the Stones' protection around more than just herself and Potter -- but also Weasley and Draco, the remaining youths singled out by Dumbledore somehow, for special roles in the war against Voldemort. For the first time he was glad she'd been forced to remain at Hogwarts. But how to find a way past Dumbledore's wards? Deep inside, a growling began. It was looking like he might actually need to ask James Potter's son -- Lily's son -- for a favor or two. With any luck, Dumbledore had only blocked Snape from reaching Hermione by owl post. If he had blocked Snape completely from Hogwarts, there was nothing that could be done short of involving Lucius in his plight. Snape knew the price Lucius would exact for his assistance: revealing the details of his passion for a Muggle-born witch.

He returned to his room and began to write a letter to Potter, explaining nearly everything, hoping that Potter's love for Hermione would make him inclined to help his perverted bastard of a Potions Master.

~*~

It was the uproar in the middle of the night that woke Snape from his sleep at the desk in the guest room, where he had lain upon the draft of the letter to Potter. There was a loud rushing noise outside: hard rain upon his windows. And, there was shouting going on downstairs. Snape could hear Lucius raging, his voice clear as a trumpet sounding, though the words were muffled. And someone was responding, arguing, in tones that sounded remarkably familiar. Snape pushed his hair out of his face and went to his door. He opened it a crack, to spy, and heard the argument progressing.

"How -- dare -- you!" Lucius, enraged. "Endangering my son in this manner! You will return that Portkey this instant. I will send you back where you came from!"

"I won't, either, and you won't send me back. Not until I have what I came for."

Snape knew that voice. His heart leapt. Hermione. Here. Here!

"And what, pray tell, would that be, you little bitch? What have you come for, that you foul my home with your muddy blood?"

"You Slytherin fuck. Take your filthy hands off me! I can't stand your putrid touch! "

The part of Snape that always stood aside, watching everything, was amused by his small spitfire. Calling Lucius names. How entertaining. But the other part of Snape, the larger part, the part that needed his Hermione in his arms, caused him to wave his wand and apparate himself to the lower floor. He could not take the time required to run down the stairs.

There, across the Hall floor, he saw Hermione, soaking wet -- from the rain? In the winter? You will catch your death, you need a warming spell. She was encumbered with a cat carrier in one hand -- that damned kneazle -- and a carryall slung over her back, and was physically struggling with Lucius. Lucius had her wrist in his grasp. Hermione's hand was clenched in a fist; she held something that he was trying to pry away from her. And even from here...oh, from so very far away...Snape could see her hands and arms, raw, red, oozing. And that wasn't all; her cheeks showed tearstains, and her eyes were reddened and swollen. What had been making her cry? Who was responsible? Who should be punished for this offense?

"She came for me, Lucius," said Snape, crossing the Hall in a very, very few strides, and sweeping Hermione from Lucius' hands. "She came...for me." With a clatter the carryall slid to the floor, and Hermione dropped the cat carrier, and Snape wrapped both arms around her, holding her tightly, her head pressed to his chest. "For me. My darling." The last two words were whispered in her ear. She was trembling in his hold, and he felt her arms steal around his waist to lock behind him.

Lucius stood staring in astonishment at the two of them. There was a long, long moment of silence, and then the explosion. "This...this is what you gave up your career and reputation for? A mudblood? A Muggle-born slut? This is what you slept with? How could you sully yourself, Severus? Did Lily teach you nothing? This was made to be fodder for a killing knife in Voldemort's court, not to be your... love. " The last word was spat at them. "And this has endangered my son, has caused Voldemort to cast his evil glare upon him. All because your lust got you sacked." His voice began to tremble in his rage, and he raised his wand. "Step aside, Severus."

Snape's glare was glittering and sharp and focused. "You will not touch her, Lucius. I would see you dead first. And you know I can do it. You know I will do it." In his arms Hermione stirred, looking out at Lucius through a tangle of hair. Her red little paw came up, and in it was her own wand, pointing back at Lucius. Snape released her enough to push her behind him and force her wand hand down.

"Get out. Get...out."

"All right. I'm going. We're going. Give me ten minutes, Lucius."

"I want that Portkey returned. I don't know how she got it away from Draco, but I want it returned. He cannot be unprotected in that school, not with Voldemort's eye turned upon him."

"Portkey?" Snape was confused. Hermione came out from behind him, just as she had the night Minerva caught them together. She would not be gainsaid, pushing away his restraining hand.

"Draco gave it to me so that I could come find you. He knew you were here."

"My son gave it to you. That's rich. You stole it, you mean." Lucius in a protective fury was awe-inspiringly frightening. His clear eyes were frigid; bright color stained his high cheekbones and the ridges of his fine brow; his lips were thin; his white teeth showed in a vampire's grimace of sharp edges and fierce eyeteeth.

"How else would I have discovered the activating words? Let them hate, as long as they fear. No, Draco gave it to me."

"Be quiet, Hermione," said Snape now, hurriedly. "Just give Lucius back that Portkey." He looked up at Lucius. "I'm sure I can explain everything," he said. He knew who must have persuaded Draco to give Hermione the Portkey -- it must have been Potter.

Hermione opened her mouth to speak again, but it was to hiss under her breath at Snape. "Don't bring Harry into this. "

Snape jerked her back against himself. "I asked you nicely to be quiet," he said, with menace. He tried to instill some private meaning into his tone. Hermione was looking up at him in a towering temper. Snape saw something in her eyes and blinked. She wants to protect Potter, he thought. Why? "The Portkey, Hermione," he said, abandoning Potter for the moment, and saw relief in her eyes. She flung the Portkey at Lucius, who caught it deftly.

"Anything you'd care to share, Severus?" said Lucius now, advancing. Snape could see the predatory gleam in Lucius' silvery eyes. The man could smell prey, it seemed, aware some key bit of information might be escaping him. He wasn't highly placed in Voldemort's organization for nothing.

"Nothing that is of your business," said Snape. Prey sparrow, but not today, my Malfoy falcon.

"I have made it my business, seeing how my son is involved in this sordid mess. Oh, when Voldemort hears you've been fucking a mudblood bitch --"

"And just who will be telling him, Lucius? You? How will that help your son, who's been fucking Harry Potter? "

Hermione pinched Snape's middle, hard. "I thought you understood -- I don't want Harry involved!"

Snape looked down at her, and pressed two fingers over her lips. "I did, but I changed my mind. He wants to play dirty, we will play dirty. Let me handle this. Not another word from you, it will only make things worse."

She looked at him mutinously, but nodded with an ungracious jerk of her head, complying.

Lucius' mouth was opening and closing like a fish's. Snape could almost hear the words sizzling in his brain. ... your son, who's been fucking Harry Potter. YOUR SON, FUCKING HARRY POTTER. Your son, in danger from Voldemort, because he's FUCKING HARRY POTTER.

When Lucius finally spoke, it was to hiss, "You have thirty minutes. Pack your things and go, and never return. Never, ever speak to me or mine again."

"First I want your word, Lucius, that you won't speak to Voldemort about this girl and myself. And in return, I won't mention Draco and Potter to him." Onyx eyes met silver eyes and dueled there, in the Hall. Neither dropped, neither blinked, but in the end Lucius capitulated. Love for his son won out over the desire to hurt Snape for bringing a mudblood bitch into Lucius' well-ordered and controlled world and placing his son at risk by not attending Voldemort's meetings.

"You have it."

"One other condition."

"Go to hell, Snape."

"I need you to contact me when Voldemort summons you next. Send an owl."

Lucius looked at him closely, with an assessing eye. "Why? Aren't you happier, not going?" His voice was ugly.

"Naturally. But I don't want Voldemort angry with me. Surely you can see that, even if you hate me. Besides, if I return to the meetings, perhaps Voldemort will leave Draco alone." I doubt it, though, my friend, especially if Voldemort should discover the identity of Potter's lover. Voldemort could ride in Potter's head not so long ago, and we never quite finished those Occlumency lessons. He may know already.

Lucius folded his arms, and Snape knew he had won. He recognized that narrowed gaze; Lucius still wanted answers to his questions, despite having ordered Snape never to speak to him again. "Fine. But go."

"Then I'm gone. I just need a few minutes to pack. And I need you to drop the wards on your Floo so I can take her out of here. Hermione -- pick up that damned kneazle of yours and follow me." He released her, strode to her carryall, slung it on his shoulder, and led her up the stairs.

Inside his room he warded and silenced the room, and then turned to Hermione, his gaze dark and glowering. "What have you done? Why are you here? Why aren't you at Hogwarts, where Dumbledore can protect you?"

Wordlessly, she opened her carryall and took out an envelope, handing it to him. In the upper corner was that happy, smiling tooth. And inside was her death warrant, her parents planning to bring her home from Hogwarts. He looked at the letter again, then set it aside. He reached for her hands and she let him take them, though he knew she longed to thrust them behind her back and hide her weakness from him. He hissed on an indrawn breath as he looked at her skin. Worse than before, worse than he had ever seen it. Worse even than the night he had been driven to Minerva's office, to write that first fatal letter to the Grangers, the thing that had sent them all down this reckless and terrible path. Hermione, Snape himself, Minerva, Dumbledore, Potter, Draco, and now, Lucius. All of them, hurt in one way or another, by his hands, his unnatural desires.

He pressed kisses on those red, red hands, and heard her whimpering. Tears were streaming down her face, again, moistening the trails that had dried there earlier. "Don't, don't," he heard himself saying, gathering her close, pulling her arms around him, holding tight to her. "Don't. You're with me now. I won't let them take you."

"They can't find me anyway, " she told him now, turning up her face. "Harry's my Secret Keeper. That's why I didn't want you bringing him up to Draco's father. With Harry holding my secrets, I can't be found anymore. And if you send me away, I won't go back to Hogwarts, and I won't go home. I'll --"

He stopped the flood of words with a kiss, groaning against her mouth. "Foolish, foolish girl. Stupid girl. Brave girl. Wonderful girl." He molded her to him and closed his eyes. "There is a place we can go, I think," he said. "Help me pack. Then we'll Floo to where we're going."

"Where are we going?"

"Someplace safe."

It was only a few minutes later that he led her back downstairs to the empty Hall and slung their luggage across their bodies. Crookshanks spat and hissed from inside his carrier. "Why are you soaking wet, Hermione? Never mind. We'll deal with that soon." Snape tossed a handful of Floo powder into the large hearth, then Hermione stepped inside with her luggage and turned to look at Snape.

"Angharad's cottage," said Snape, and she was gone.

A moment later, the Hall was empty as Snape followed Hermione, and when Lucius went storming into Snape's bedroom only a few minutes after, to confirm for himself that they were gone, the only remnant of Snape to be found was his Hogwarts teaching robe, neatly hanging in the armoire.


	25. Concordia Discors

"I'm high but I'm grounded  
I'm sane but I'm overwhelmed  
I'm lost but I'm hopeful baby"

\-- Hand In My Pocket. Alanis Morissette.

As opposed to Malfoy Manor's impeccable fireplace, the hearth in which they landed was all covered with ancient soot. Fighting the urge to drop her cargo and scratch that soot off her tear-stained face, Hermione stumbled into the small interior and, careful to place her luggage away from the filthy fireplace, collapsed onto the cold stone floor. Snape, emerging immediately behind her with his two bags worth of property, was almost too late to catch her.

She heard his carryall and the small suitcase dropping on the flagstones, blinking as a clasp unbuckled and some of the trunk's contents spilled over the soot-stained paving stones. Then she was in his arms, sobbing; her nose replete with mucus, and wild, dripping locks of hair glued to her soot-covered face.

"I want this off," she wept hysterically, her fingers digging into his forearms. The sleeves of his shirt, she noted through her veil of tears, were also blackened. "This is w-wet and disgusting and I'm t-tired and I want this off."

" _Calm down_ , Hermione." Snape's voice was soft, and yet unequivocal, demanding that she stop wriggling at once. "Come, I'll cast a cleansing charm on us both, then you can remove these soaked clothes and take a bath."

She let out a sob, her helpless struggle abating somewhat at the prospect. "A… a bath?"

"There will be _no_ scraping."

It was Snape's last comment, manifesting his lack of trust in her - which was understandable but nonetheless painful - that made her last wax seal crack. So instead of kicking him off and telling him to go to hell, she dropped boneless in his arms; a soul without skin to protect it from his dark, piercing eyes, or perhaps a lump of burnt sugar, sticking to the bottom of the pot in which it had been scorched instead of melting; bitter and smelly and scalding.

Tired, she closed her eyes, the sobs coming in wild, stirring waves now that she didn't try to control them. The always alert, always analyzing part of her brain was telling her she'd been picked up and rocked gently in the arms of the man she loved. Her wrenched body recognized the slow rhythm and slowly yielded to it. Deep inside her, however, in the cavity of her heart; in her womb; in all these parts of her body where she imagined certain emotions had settled over the years, there was only a great void: a terrible, faceless exhaustion.

"I missed you so much," she murmured, too tired to mind the soot coming off his clothes. Spittle was blending with charcoal where her swollen lips pressed against his shoulder and the mixture tasted like ash on her mouth. Sobbing, she reached her hand to wipe it clean. "I didn't mean it to get that bad- I'm sorry, it's just, it's just-"

He hushed her. "I'm not angry with you-"

"-But you're disappointed," she choked. "That I let my self-discipline slip-"

"Foolish child." Against her body, Snape's chest rose, then fell in a deep, steadying breath. "It pains me to see you hurting yourself this way, but I am not disappointed with you."

"Th-thank you," she stuttered, stifling a sob. "Will you… get us clean now?"

"Yes, I shall. Just allow me to seal the fireplace." Pressing a chaste kiss to the top of her head, he adjusted her still shaking body in his hold. Once he made sure the hearth was disconnected from the Floo Network, he rose, swinging her up into his arms, and began making his way across the narrow sitting room.

Finally calm enough to notice her surroundings, Hermione opened her eyes - still flocculent and sensitive - and scanned the confined, almost monastic space. A large shadow of an armchair, shrouded in white cloth to hide it from the knowing eye of Time was located not far from the fireplace. What might have been a dresser or a sewing armoire stood in a corner near the armchair, concealed under the same white linen. There were no pictures on the wall, though the moonlit view, framed through the two large windows Snape had spelled open as he moved along the room, would be considered enough of a decoration by some.

"Wait-" she stopped him before they exited the room. "Crook- I can't leave him in that awful carrier."

Growling, Snape reached for his wand, pointing it at Crookshanks' carrier. The cat, apparently mistaking her lover's intention, was hissing and humping at Snape.

" _Alohomora!_ "

Finally free, Crookshanks spurted out of the carrier, running across and about the room in a burst of nasty feline hyperactivity.

"Couldn't you possibly have left him at Hogwarts?" Snape hissed in her ear.

"How could I leave him behind?" she asked indignantly. "I'm never going back there." Then, because the wound was still open and septic she added: "you don't mind Crook, now do you?"

Snape sighed. "I suppose if I'm to keep you, I have no choice but to tolerate his presence."

She laughed, hurting and relieved all at once; tears, soot and rain trickling between her parted lips. Absentmindedly she found herself wondering what would be this mixture's chemical breakdown; saline tears, relatively neutralized rain water and dusty carbon - hardly aware that her voice broke in mid-laugh and she was half-sobbing, half-laughing.

" _Concordia discors_ ," Snape murmured softly to her, "Open that door for me, Hermione. I don't have a free hand."

"Was that a password?" she asked, leaning from his arms to turn the knob and push the door open.

He shook his head. "Merely a notion: 'discordant harmony'. It's one of the ways I perceive you. Laughter and tears, anger and complacency, strength and frailty, all at the same time. As far as passwords... you should know that none of the doors in this house is warded. It was not Angharad's way. She believed in asking visitors to honor her wishes, not in denying access."

So this was his mentor's home- the revelation left her gaping. She wanted to ponder it; wanted to watch the rooms they passed on their way to this vast, yet modest bathroom, with that newfound knowledge, and put the pieces together. And once she assembled the piece into a logical picture, to hold the coloured sketch she came up with so it would overlap these sections of Snape's life which she knew almost nothing about; compare it with the new revelation about Lily Potter being his high-school girlfriend; to unfold every piece of information she had concerning this man, dust it once again - and once again, put it together. But first she needed to see him whole and up close; first she wanted the void inside her filled and the liquid exhaustion vaporized.

_It must be useful, that one human being is capable of reviving you, she thought as he gently uncoiled her arms. And on the other hand: how risky, how dangerous it is. Dependency always comes with a price. A week away from you should have reminded me of this, and yet the first thing I do once we are reunited is crawl on my knees, begging for another dose of the drug that is you._

Snape carried her into the bath and gently set her on her feet. As she slid down his body, she listened to the wet, soaked fabric of her clothes rustling as it separated from Snape's. Black, wet cambric, detaching from black, soggy cotton: both cloths shifting against humid skin and sliding back into place; heavy with water. There were large water-stains where dampness diffusing off her school uniform permeated into his clothing; gluing Snape's shirt and trousers to his lean, sinewy frame. His face - which he had buried in her mane only moments ago - was covered with the same mixture of rainwater and soot. Oddly enough, standing there - watching him bathing in the moonlight - he didn't seem dirty to her. Only a man - her man - whose face had been blackened with soot.

Stepping closer, she stretched out her hand, touching her index finger to his lips. He angled an eyebrow, but aside from that, remained motionless. Snape's deep-set, enigmatic eyes were following her movements as she trailed her fingers along the fine curve of his mouth. The murky blend of water and charcoal coming off his skin was now clinging to the tips of her fingers.

"The cleansing- the cleansing spell," she stammered, anxious to get rid of the soot defiling _her_ body. Snape might be untouchable, unstained even when soiled, but not she.

He nodded, pointing his wand at her. In an instant, the soot was gone, but she was still damp, cold and shivering; her hair dripping water.

A moonbeam caught in a drop of water coiling around an unruly lock. She watched it fascinated as it slid down the wiry tress, then, reaching its tip, hung there for a moment - shining in the moonlight - before the inevitable happened and the shimmering orb broke from its stem: swirling down toward the flagstones.

Blinking, she raised up her head. Moonlight cascading from the aperture at the end of the room shone in small pond of water pooling at her feet. It seemed to glow in Snape's pale complexion - clean at last - just the way she remembered it from Samhain night: he was catching the starlight and holding it. Strange; ethereal; ugly - beautiful.

"I missed you so much it was like internal bleeding; I thought I was going mad." Sniffing, she reached her cold, stupid fingers to the collar of his shirt, fighting the small buttons holding the two pieces of fabric together.

In the wan moonlight, his milky skin stood painfully against the black of his clothing, so white it was almost provocative: a red-letter or a lily's brand. Drinking in the sight, she attempted to tug the wet cambric of his shirt, angry and frustrated when it wouldn't yield to her.

"Poetic justice, now isn't it?" she continued, the chill penetrating her palms and denying her full control of her fingers. Furious, ugly red against his bright sternum. "I'm not doing this to flatter you - Merlin knows your ego is inflated enough as it is, but it's the only way I know to explain to you why is it I expect you to be kind enough as to let me scratch my own itches in the way I see fit." With his shirt finally off, she now struggled to unbutton his trousers, frustrated when her trembling hands wouldn't comply. In the end, Snape had to help her, first disposing of his shoes and socks, then removing his trousers.

"What is it you want, Hermione?" he asked her, reaching to pull away his boxers, his cock springing free once the confining pants were removed. "Another game? Another way for you to abuse yourself with me? Must it all be about sex, Hermione?"

"No, no!" she cried in desperation, wrapping her arms around her body although it made the cold fabric of her robes stick closer. Tears were pricking her eyes again and she swore silently, angry that she couldn't be dragged far enough from the edge so as not to find herself reacting so disproportionately every time some stupid misunderstanding occurred between them.

"Here, here," mumbling, she stepped closer, placing her spread hands on his chest. His skin was cold and damp but slow heat was pulsing under, seeping into her palms. "It needs to… it needs to- hurt, maybe-" she moistened her lips, unsure of what she wanted to say. "It needs to be as much as possible- and as agonizing as possible, and it needs to be as sweet and as filling-- so if you ever leave me, I am never- I am never that hollow again-" her voice was shaking. "I don't ever want to feel that way again."

Level with his chest now, she could see his Adam's apple bobbing; her fingers on his skin casting giddy, eerie shadows.

Snape's large, slightly roughened palm, reached to tuck a stray lock of hair away from her face. "Hermione, I'm sorry-"

"The 's' word," she taunted him, leaning to press her lips to the hollow running between his pectoral muscles.

"Indeed," Snape murmured, suddenly burying his hand in her mane; forcing her head to tilt. "One of those words which automatically causes your defenses to kick in, reducing you into a spitting child who's too busy biting off her own tail to see the monster she's facing is but a mere Boggart."

Her lips tightened, and she tried to shake her head free. "That's unfair."

"It's completely fair. You wanted me naked, now pay in the same coin, and look me in the eyes." His voice softened. "Look at me, Hermione. I want you to look at me."

Her voice was sore and raspy. "That's unfair."

Snape caressed her cheek, thumb sliding down her cheekbone, under the swollen curve of her lower lip, where it came to rest. "Does it matter?" he asked her. "It's not a contest. Please look at me."

"Very well." Yielding, at last, she allowed their gazes to meet and hold. _I do sometimes wonder if a gaze has a chemical breakdown. His must be acid. Mine is probably base: how come we don't neutralize each other?_ Forcing down her saliva, she made herself look him in the eye. "All right, Snape. I'm here, at your mercy. Beautiful white neck, don't you think? Please: either lacerate my throat, or unhand me."

Snape shook his head. "Calm down," he ordered her. "Stop fighting like a caged animal - and don't avert your eyes - look at me, Hermione. Look at _me_."

The tears that had been pricking her eyes were now streaming down her face; her chest shaking with detained, locked sobs. Yet, she was holding his gaze; his eyes dark and bewitching in the moonlight. "I am looking at you, you ill meaning bastard!"

He nodded. "Good. You should know, then, that I am not going to hurt you. And you should stop being afraid of me. Fear anybody else, but don't be afraid of me." At that, he released his hold of her, the hand buried in her mane gently easing to cup her tear-stricken face.

Hermione frowned, stepping a tad closer to him. "Aren't you afraid of everyone and everything, oh Master of Warded Doors?"

He chuckled. "Paranoia, my dear, is never overestimated. It saved my life many times."

She shook her head. "That was just teasing. But I hardly think you are better than me, Snape. Worse, in fact. I'm probably… just overwhelmed to see the great Snape cracking, overwhelmed by this horrible week. I suppose I'm just terribly touchy myself, with a none too pleasant history of being everybody's favourite swot…" Shrugging her shoulders, she lifted her hand, wiping away her tears. "Snape-"

"Yes?"

"The other night, after Professor McGonagall burst in, when you sent me away, you said…"

His mouth thinned and she could see the play of muscles under his skin, as his features set into a cold, detached expression. "I said many things."

"Ah," she hummed, "who is backing off now. But what you said," she continued, serious to a fault, though not because it might have protected her from him, since it could not. "What you said- did you mean it?"

Snape frowned. "Yes… I meant- that."

Looking at him, she thought she saw the child he once was staring out of the man's eyes- not at her, but through her, at the low stool on which he placed his carefully folded clothes; at the old-fashioned china tub; at the dust particles swirling in that moon-ray, that now enveloped both of them.

The beginning of a smile was tugging at the verge of her lips. Closing the rest of the distance separating them, she coiled her arms around Snape's neck: clothed, wet arms, around naked, alabaster skin. Chilled, his gaze suddenly refocused and was back on her face. This close, she could feel the angular, hard planes of his body adjusting to her nearness, her soft curves melting against him; into him, as if he might as well be the place where she ran to hide from the world. The hot, insistent bulge of his erection pressed against her belly; a somewhat worldly reminder that she was being childish, romanticizing a man who should not be romanticized unless she wished herself both a headache and heartache.

_Real_ \- she thought. _Not to save me, but to revive me. Not a razor for a man, but a man instead of a razor, can you see the difference? God, how much I love you_. "Kiss me, Snape."

He nodded, bringing their heads close enough for his lips to hover over her mouth; close enough that she felt the hooked tip of his nose brushing her cheek and was able to note the fine mesh of wrinkles under his eyes. Thin and spindly as a spider web they spread over the sallow skin of his face, following the muscle-structure it covered and marking an elusive trail from his dark, expressive eyes, to the severe line of his mouth. She closed her eyes, her hard, almost sore nipples crushing against his chest, lips swollen and pulsing with anticipation.

Always one to inflict or yield to authority, the soft brush of his lips was not what she yearned for: even after long weeks of learning patience, she was no more readied to have her satisfaction withheld. It was hardly a matter of tolerance, though she admitted to being a greedy creature. It was the sweetness of his kiss, which was nearly scalding - the fear of being naked in her pleasure: paralleling Snape's fear, of being caught naked extraditing words. Which he offered her.

Without deepening the kiss, she let her lips move over his mouth: his lips were cold, partly open. Moistened where she brushed them with hers; the satiny texture slightly curdled where the cold bit into them before she cast the warming spell.

They kissed gently; mouths parting at once. The soft, slobbery sound that followed, reminded her of a bivalve plucked by the sweet water of a lake.

Leaning again into the kiss, she felt Snape's breath on her mouth. It was hot at first, but quickly it made her chilly; cooling down the water still glazing her skin. His tongue sneaked out, skillfully following the contours of her lips, then darting between them, to meet the tip of her tongue. The sharp contrast between the cold, slightly moist lips, and the hot, wet mouth slowly opening over hers, was delicious. Meeting midway, their tongues were tentatively stroking each other. Then, giving in to her instincts, she let her tongue coil invitingly around his - a velvety, slobbery, slow temptation - daring it to roam further into her mouth.

Back in Hogwarts, where she left her old life, she could hear Patil and Brown exchange tips about kissing. Tilt your head in that direction; do that thing with your tongue; careful about you teeth! How petty: how irrelevant. What an utter waste of time, when all you had to do was let your instinct guide you. Sometimes she thought that for her, kissing this man may be as natural as breathing. It was erotic, yes, but evoked this certain feeling that could be only described as the sensation of a child - their long lost echo, perhaps - picking tulips in a snowy meadow; chasing after a kite with the sun at their back; wide-eyed girl staring at a faun whose packages were rolling on the snow at her feet.

They were still kissing when Snape's fingers reached for the laces at the collar of her school robe, swiftly undoing them. "You should be out of those soggy clothes," he breathed against her lips. "Warm up, and rest."

She moaned, capturing his mouth and drawing him into a long, desperate kiss. "I don't want to be warm and rested. I want you."

"You don't know what you want," he murmured, pulling away once more, clever hands peeling her school robe from her body and tugging it over her head. Underneath, she was still wearing her school uniform; tweed skirt, white linen shirt and a woolen sweater.

Swatting his hands aside, she leaned to fasten her mouth to the clean, graceful arch of his left trapezius muscle. His skin, just the way she remembered it, had tasted of rainwater, forest and musk, lucid and pungent at the same time. Yet a certain sourness, a certain haunted flavor she had always tasted in his sweat was missing. Somehow, he was better. Healthier. She told him so, aggravated when he used the opportunity to grip her waist, placing her on the tub's curled brim.

She glowered at him, attempting to kick off his hands that were untying the laces of her shoes.

"Do you wish to bathe in your clothes?" he asked her angrily.

"Of course I don't!"

"Then stop acting like a baby."

She sobbed. "You're pushing me away."

Sighing, he bent over the bath's edge, placing her shoes aside, then was back kneeling in front of her. Taking one of her cold, damp hands in his, Snape used his free hand to remove an unruly lump of wet hair away from her face. Trailing her lips with his thumb, he frowned: obviously looking for the right words to express his thoughts. "It is not my intention to make you feel rejected- but you are scattered -No, listen to me," he calmed her when she opened her mouth to protest, "-you are hurt, and so, you are overreacting. Please, let me see you're bathed," she heard him say softly, her heart swelling at the softness in his voice. "Then I want you to have some sleep. Then we can see."

Swallowing her tears, Hermione nodded.

He didn't exactly smile, but his eyes in the moonlight seemed clearer, brighter. Enough for her to see the deep-grey circling the black irises. His fingers - strong, but like his voice; painfully gentle when he willed it to be - grasped her right ankle. Digging under the elastic band holding the white, plain sock to her shin, he had carefully unrolled it down Hermione's lightly muscular leg, exposing a pale, pasty foot. Leaning over the tub's rim, he stuffed it into her right shoe, then turned to remove her other sock, fingers hovering over her skin.

Being touched like that wasn't necessarily arousing, she reflected as she watched him moving to flick the copper tap open. It was rather… it stirred something which was so far numb, reminding her that her skin was hungry for his skin: _perhaps this is it- a hunger that should be satiated, much like sex. But then, why is there this horrible deprivation all of a sudden when he's gone, and why would the metaphorical voices shut-up only when he touches me. You should know, Snape, that I am not pleased in the least, only sickly dependent_.

Hot, steaming water was now pouring from the tap; tickling her toes with its blunt heat. Finished with her footwear, Snape was now approaching her sweater. Straightening his back a little in order to pull it over her head, his torso was sheathed between her parted thighs. Lowering her gaze, she could see his half erect cock rising up from its thatch of dark curls.

Noticing where her eyes were wandering, Snape looked at her amusedly. "Later."

Reaching her hand before he could stop her, she gently revealed the purplish head, stroking the extremely sensitive glans. "Maybe."

At that, he indeed removed her hand, bringing her fingers to his lips and kissing them. "We'll see."

"You're evil."

"I'm trying to do what's best by you," he sighed. "I'm not always sure whether I actually make the right decision, but I surely try."

Efficiently, as if he was attempting to negate the possibility of the action carrying any kind of sexual insinuation, he unfastened the buttons at the front of her shirt, swiftly tugging the damp linen over her shoulder. However, try as he might, he could not prevent the proximity of his hands to her heavy, aching breasts; nor could he prevent the heat diffusing from his skin to penetrate her epidermis. Arching her back, she tried to rub her already hardened nipples against his palms, moaning as he quickly evaded her. When he leaned to unclasp the hook, she could once again reach for his straining cock, fully erect by now, and swirl her index finger over the gaping piss-hole.

"Hermione-" Snape swore, gritting his teeth. "You should really stop doing that."

"I don't want to. I want you." Swiftly catching his hand, she brought it under her skirt, pushing aside the edge of her knickers and leading his fingers between her moistened folds. "I want you," she pleaded with him, gasping as his fingers slid past her nether lips, against her thigh and were back resting on his hip.

The water pouring into the bath had reached Snape's flexed knee in the meanwhile.

"Can you take off your skirt and pants?" he asked, looking suddenly exhausted; tired of arguing with her.

"No," she answered spitefully. "My hands are cold, which affects my wrists badly."

"Right." Rising to his feet, he urged her to stand up as well. Outstretching his hands to circle her waist, he undid the button and zipper holding the garment to her body.

"Please lift your leg," he ordered her, crouching to hold the cloth at her feet. "Now the other one-"

Pouting her lips like a little child might do, she followed his orders, unaware of the hot water lapping her ankles and climbing slowly up her shins, only to the naked man who dispatched of her clothing with cold efficiency.

"Don't you want me anymore?"

He growled, tossing her skirt on the flagstones. "Stop behaving like a lost puppy, Hermione. You have every evidence that I want you; I gave up my career and my reputation for you and I would do it again, but I won't comply to your misguided wish to fuck when what you need is rest, nor will I feed your insecurities by reassuring you every time you decide I don't want you for some erroneous reason."

A flush was heating her cheeks, spreading down to her neck and chest and making her aware of her erect nipples. Angry, and yet surprisingly calm, she lifted her eyes to look at him.

"You don't want me to behave like a lost puppy? Fine. Then stop treating me like one. Stop saying my wishes are misguided and that there is a fault with my reasoning. I know I am overacting, but I do need your reassurance. I know it's hard for you to give it, and I am trying-" she halted, biting on her lower lip -"I'm trying to let it be enough, knowing we all have our difficulties. But having my own holes doesn't make me a lost puppy anymore than it makes you."

Sighing, she bent to remove her pants, folding the scanty piece of cloth and stepping out of the bathtub to put it on the stool where Snape's clothes were displayed. Picking up her tweed skirt on the way, she folded it as well, and draped it over a towel-hanger not far from the stool.

The small ponds of water she left behind became a small trail of mirrors once the moonbeams hit them. They captured the soft, silvery light of the moon and reflected it so it sprayed onto the china tiles on the walls. Wavering along the tiles draping the room, the once lucid moonlight had sparkled similarly to the pixies' diluted flicker; leading innocent travelers astray until they lost their way inside the ancient, dark forest. _Lost_ , she mused- _so not to be found. But have I lost my way back to you?_

Stepping back into the bathtub, Hermione felt the water wrap around her shins. The tap, she noted, was closed, and Snape was sitting at the tub's rear end, knees drawn to his body; his arms crossed over his knees. At this position, the water licked his upper abdominal muscles: the bath was just full enough for her to sink in and be enveloped in hot, steaming water, reaching the line of her neck. Doing exactly that, she half crawled, half floated over to Snape, gently moving his hands aside and seating herself between his parted legs.

She was pleased to see he didn't make objections, and yet disappointed at his lack of cooperation. Especially, at his refusal to look at her.

"Snape," she whispered, turning around so she could face him. His fully erect cock was pressing against her belly. Outstretching her hands to cup his face, she stared into his eyes. "Snape."

"What?" he asked, blinking tiredly.

"I am a lost puppy," she murmured, planting a kiss on his lips, "and I do want you. One of the reasons I want you to sleep with me now, is for you to help me pretend I'm whole: something we both know is false. But I also want you to sleep with me because I want you, and because I love you, and people who love each other have sex with each other. That what all the silly agony aunts say: 'wait until you find someone you love, only then have sex.' I love you Snape," she whispered, giving him another, deeper kiss. "Make love to me because I love you. And because you love me, too."

"Is that what you want?" he asked, his hand moving to play with a ropey curl that floated in the water between them.

Hermione nodded, moving closer to him. Her nipples crushed against his chest and his full, pulsing cock pressed deeper onto the soft curves of her abdomen. She wanted to spread her thighs, feel the contours of his penis and testicles against her vulva, undulate with him sprawled under her straddled hips and have the tip of his cock silkily rubbing her engorged clitoris. Most annoyingly, however, the side of the tub was in her way, preventing her from doing so: if only she could get him to sink lower… then the flowing current of her thought was cut, when Snape's lips found hers, and only the analyzing, cataloguing part of her brain kept functioning, noting how lovely was his tongue parting her lips, skillfully exploring her palate: how sweet and warm and soft were his lips, applying mild suction on hers, while his tongue was probing the clean, enamel sharpness of her teeth… the lukewarm, sweet, yet elusive taste of his spittle in her mouth.

His hands - _I would never be cured of my fascination with his hands_ \- were roaming down her neck, finding the small mounds of her breasts, and lightly squeezing them. She moaned as his mouth left her lips; its taste, its touch, still burning them, but arched her back into his mouth when he leaned to close his lips over a taut nipple.

Even more blood surged to the tip of her breast, to tinge her nipple redder when he sucked on it. He laved her nipple with his tongue, flicking on it sharply, then returned to his languid, decadent suction, working a slow, maddening rhythm. Maddeningly gentle, maddeningly cruel. Until the pull of his lips was the only one she recognized, somewhat like the moon's call to the waves, summoning them back to the sea, and unto the shore. Then, when she was about to bury her hands in his hair and urge him to go on faster, he increased the suction, adding a bit of teeth, until she thought she might come from his mouth on her breast alone.

Meanwhile, his other hand was teasing her second breast. Tweaking the nipple gently and then more forcefully, he caused her to gasp. Then, without giving any proceeding notice he switched breasts; sucking fervently on her tortured nipple. She cried out, fingers entwining into his wet hair, affixing to his scalp: humping her back onto his lips and hands.

Chuckling, Snape detached himself from her, drawing away just when she urged him to give more. Then giving more, and retreating: coaxing every bit of pleasure she could provide him with. _As if my sexual fulfillment is an integral part of this act for him. Though I suppose it is- not in the artificial, selfish sense, of satisfying your partner so you can stroke your own ego saying; 'hey, she came. I'm an excellent lover.' But because my pleasure gives him pleasure, because it's a fine art and should be conducted properly… because he cares for me._

_And likewise._

Reaching between their bodies, she touched his cock, missing the telltale moisture at its head, as it had been swept away by the water in the tub. Closing her hand around the thick stem, she squeezed lightly, looking at Snape's eyes while doing so. His pupils widened at once, leaving only a thin arch of wild grey circling the black orbs. Encouraged by his reaction, Hermione squeezed more forcefully, this time bringing her other hand, too; index finger trailing between the exposed glans. This actually made him groan.

Pleased with her lover's reaction, she moved to the sack of his balls, nestling them gently inside her open palm. Pressing lightly, she was glad to note his testicles seemed to grow heavier, more substantial in her hand. She was about to continue, when he reached his hand to stop her.

Moistening her lips, she looked at him with misunderstanding.

"Too close," he said, his voice husky.

She nodded, leaning to kiss him, feeling the fingers - which only a moment ago sneaked to remove her hand from his scrotum - sneaking between her legs.

One long, aristocratic finger moved in first, parting her folds and brushing over her clitoris while doing so. Hermione gasped as the finger found her entrance, plunging inside, then moving in slow, accurate circles; deliberately stretching her. Another finger joined its friend inside the wet, velvety tunnel, sliding along the pliant, elastic walls of her vagina. The two fingers were teasing her in a way that caused Hermione's vaginal muscles to flex and shrink around them. It went on like that for a while, two of Snape's fingers twisting in and out of her body, when a third finger was added, this time followed with his thumb; swirling over her clitoris.

She cried out, her nails digging into the flesh of his shoulders, but Snape only hummed, and cruelly pulled his fingers out of her body. "I want you to turn around," he said quietly, placing his hands on her waist. "This bath may be wide, but I think the most comfortable thing for us to do is for you to sit in my lap."

She nodded. "Would you give me a hand?"

"Of course."

With Snape's aid, she was once again recumbent with her back to him, sitting athwart his hips with her thighs spread open. She could not see his facial expression, but Hermione had deeply suspected an evil grin when she straightened, and taking his erection in her hand, had blindly aimed it to face her entrance. The swollen tip brushed her clitoris, making her moan, then settled against her opening. Lowering herself, she felt her body stretch to welcome the penetration; laving and wrapping it in slick heat, much like the water around her was moving and undulating. Humping her back, she made sure he was sheathed even further into her body, instinctively looking for the familiar pressure of his balls pressing against her perineum - and not finding it.

Instead, a long, sinewy arm was wrapped around her waist, Snape's skilled, clever fingers sliding between her straddled thighs and her parted nether lips, to the pulsating nub that was her clitoris. Without wasting time, he began to circle it, stirring the small bud back and forth with the tip of his index finger. She screamed, arching against him, her head hanging against his shoulder. His lips bit into the curve of her neck, and with his fingers now pinching her clitoris, she began moving over his erection; rising until he was almost out of her body, then sinking deeply. His other hand found her breasts, fondling them, caressing them, sometimes crushing, in time with her motions and his stimulating of her clitoris. All fervent; heated; dizzying.

The water around them waved over the curled rim of the tub and splattered on the floor. The moonlight, spraying off the splattered water was feverish, and the pixies on the walls were dancing around them.

Her orgasm, tangy and sour, was a fist of pleasure low in her abdomen, threatening to crush both of them when it came. She threw back her head, thinking how much better it must be, to be a wolf; able to wail your pain and sorrow and pleasure and happiness, crying out loud as her vagina clenched around him, fisting him into his own orgasm. The water might have taken the wet, sweaty sweetness of sex, but when he spurted his seed deep inside her body, she could feel the hotness and the wetness of it, and she thought she might have even heard him gasp her name.


	26. Coming and Going

_my love is building a building  
around you, a frail slippery  
house, a strong fragile house  
  
...  
  
my love is building a magic, a discrete  
tower of magic  
  
\-- e.e.cummings_  
  
  
  
"Begone," muttered Snape to Hermione's familiar. The half-kneazle twined itself around his legs where Snape sat on the raised hearth, tending to an experimental potion intended to be used to encourage summery weather around five or six plants he had found dormant in Angharad's garden; plants he had need of for other potions. "Unlike your foolish mistress, I cannot be persuaded by your cattish blandishments." He moved his foot suddenly towards the cat, intending to startle it. The cat humped its back at him and hissed, but did not depart. "I will not pet you, you will bite me. Foul beast."  
  
"What? Why do you say that?" Hermione taunted him from where she sat at the kitchen table, writing on a piece of notepaper.  
  
Snape growled. "Your damned pet will get hairs in my potion, and ruin it."  
  
Hermione got up from her chair and came towards him, moving to sit on his knee and wind her arms around his neck. "Just look at you two. You're practically twins separated at birth; both ugly as sin, both growling and hissing and spitting and arching your back when angry, and both purring when pleased. I think you're going to become best friends." To show him the truth of her words, she twined the fingers of one hand through his hair and massaged his scalp. It _did_ feel good, but still Snape scowled at her, for with her other hand she was scratching the cat's head as well. The cat looked at Snape smugly.  
  
"I can hear his damned thoughts," Snape muttered.  
  
Hermione laughed. "I've often thought that myself. Did you hear him calling you 'git' just now, Snape?"  
  
He shoved her off his knee, and she landed rather painfully on the stone floor, laughing up at him. "You don't really mind Crook and his bad language, now do you?" she said to him winsomely. She held her arms up to him, but instead of following her down he used them to pull her back up to kneel between his knees, where he could look into her eyes and think about kissing her rosy mouth.  
  
"I suppose that now that I am reintroduced to a lost family member, I have no choice but to tolerate his presence. And at least his language is better than yours," he said with a sigh.  
  
"That's better." She allowed him a kiss or two before she nodded to his cauldron. "Stir?" She got up and went back to her list at the table, then took it into the small kitchen area and began opening cabinets. "We need several things. Let's go into the village this afternoon."  
  
"There's canned fish, and canned green beans," he pointed out.  
  
Hermione curled her lips. "We had that yesterday, _and_ the day before. You need fresh vegetables. Fresh meat. Whole grains, bread. Fruit."  
  
" _I_ need those things?" He frowned at the cauldron and added a pinch of mugwort harvested from Angharad's neglected garden, which they were slowly setting to rights, weeding, clearing the flagstone paths, and transplanting a few plants that tolerated being moved during the cold and rainy season. The potion smoked a bit and he drew back from it, shielding his eyes.  
  
"I know you read the nutrition book I gave you. I've seen the pages with your smudgy thumb marks on them. Yes, _you_ need them. You looked better after you stayed with the Malfoys, a bit more flesh under your skin. But you're getting that...transparent look again."  
  
Snape sat back on his heels at the fireplace and studied her, almost smiling at her seriousness. "I do not smudge my books."  
  
"You smudge the ones you use frequently." She was pleased that he liked her gift, and pleased that it was one of the few things he had brought with him from Hogwarts.  
  
Snape had relished these three weeks alone in Angharad's cottage with Hermione. It seemed that they both had blossomed. His mask of a face had cracked; he was free to smile at her jokes and petty grievances over the troublesome, sooty fireplace and rickety chairs; free to take hold of her at any time, sure of his welcome within her arms; free to wander what survived of Angharad's garden after so many years and see how the snow rimed the brown seeds and stems, or how rain beat down the plants. Simply: free.  
  
For her part, Hermione's hands and arms were as clear as he had seen them, almost since the school year began. She delighted in the frequent use of her magic, and demanded continually that he teach her more, and more, and more. She was the most apt of pupils, as always. And she, as well, slid into his arms often, or into his lap as he sat reading one of the few books they had between them -- for he didn't quite dare to send for his Hogwarts library, not yet. And every night she wound her arms around him. It was still awkward for him to sleep with another body in his bed, but he was learning. He could be taught to love.  
  
And love -- glorious, ravishing love. Idyllic, splendid, and rarified. Playful, in a way it had never been at Hogwarts, where always there was the lurking knowledge that if they were to be caught, it would result in serious repercussions. But here, the worst had already happened, and now they could be together without reservation.  
  
Snape had begun brewing them both contraceptive potions, though they'd had to go to the village for most of the ingredients, and find a few others in the snowy woods. Hermione had thought to pack her school cauldron; compulsive planner that she was, she had foreseen a potential need to be able to brew potions herself. There had been an awkward few days of waiting before they were sure she could not be pregnant -- in the first joyous rush of togetherness, they had forgotten neither of them had recently drunk the potions, but Hermione also felt sure she was far enough along in her lunar cycle to be safe, once she gave it thought and consulted her journal. For Snape's part, the thought of Hermione, pregnant with his child, was not entirely repellent; not in the way that discovering Lily, big with James' get, had been all those years ago. The knowledge was a bit frightening to him. Still, they were better off without that complication.  
  
Blissfully together.  
  
"You go," he said, stirring the potion gently. "I should watch this."  
  
"I went the last two times. And we need more than I can carry alone, Snape."  
  
"Just shrink it and apparate home." _Home_.  
  
"Put that potion in stasis and come with me. You know it's not smart for me to be seen doing magic in the village."  
  
Snape sighed. "It's just..."  
  
"...you don't understand the Muggle world, do you?" She strolled to him and he watched her sashay, his mouth quirking to the side. She would coax him with hints of sex, he thought, and he would allow her. Even encourage her. "You must learn. You used to live in it; have you forgotten everything?"  
  
"It was different when Angharad was here. People brought her things. She was the local wise woman; she hardly had to go to town."  
  
"We can't risk that, though. Word might get back to the wizarding world, and then we'd be caught." She bent down to stare into his eyes, and he was able to look down the neck of her button-down shirt, to where her small breasts were cupped in her bra and left that mesmerizing, shadowy hollow between them, that fragrant place. He loved to look at her, and she knew it. His mouth twisted up quickly to catch her lips, but she knew what he'd planned and was faster, pulling away. "None of that," she insisted. "Come on."  
  
"All right." He waved his wand and suspended the potion for the time being. The fire beneath it banked itself, barely glowing eyes of coals among the ash.  
  
He felt like a teenager, walking beside her down the frosty lane to the village, wrapped in a winter coat transfigured from his cloak, his left arm about her, her right arm about him, under the coat. From time to time he looked down at her and always found her attention sharply focused on the plants she could see from the lane.  
  
On their last walk she had noted one of Angharad's sacred oaks, and returned later with her flask to harvest its rainwater while he climbed its slick branches for mistletoe. They had resumed their moon rituals at Angharad's Circle. Snape was glad she was shielded by the force they created, and had explained to her how it worked, and how it seemed to block Voldemort's summoning, as well as how it had protected Potter for a time at Hogwarts. At those words, she had squirmed anxiously, torn between wanting to return to school to protect Potter and Weasley and the need to stay where she was safe. There was not a good way to contact Potter unless he first contacted her, but she had a letter already written, detailing what he was to do for a ritual, and hoping that Draco or Ron could perform it with him sufficient to raise the Needfire and protect them all.  
  
As they neared the village, he released her to walk on her own. They found the greengrocer's and Hermione pushed open the door. Snape followed her. She immediately picked up a basket and handed it back to him. "I'm to be a pack mule, am I?" he muttered. She ignored this rudeness, and started choosing among the lettuces for one that seemed fresh. Rejecting them all, she moved on to spinach, and finally chose three bunches to tuck in his basket.  
  
"I don't like spinach," he told her.  
  
"I don't recall asking you. Spinach has iron." She was looking at radishes now.  
  
"I don't like those, either."  
  
"You have to eat more than porridge and fruit." One of the radish bunches suited her, and into the basket it went. When her back was turned, Snape put it back. She found a vegetable marrow she liked, and put it in the basket. Her eyes lifted. "Go and fetch the radishes you put back," she said to him now. "You thought perhaps I wouldn't notice?"  
  
With bad grace, Snape stretched back for the bunch of red roots, and plopped them in. "I'd rather we not eat those."  
  
"I like them. It's not always about you, Snape."  
  
A cheery voice greeted them from the back of the shop. "Hullo, young miss! I see you've brought your dad with you today."  
  
Snape bridled, looking askance at Hermione. She froze, and Snape was suddenly sure what she was thinking. "I am her guardian," he said now, swiftly, and his words appeared to release her. He put his hand on her shoulder, finding her tense.  
  
"Ah. An uncle of sorts, then." The man came from behind his counter, a long vegetable knife in one hand and a trimmed head of cauliflower in the other. He set the white vegetable down in the pile with the rest.  
  
"Guardian," corrected Snape, starting to glare. "Do you, perhaps, have fresh pumpkin juice?"  
  
Hermione turned from where she was examining some broccoli. She spoke to the grocer. "He's my _lover_ ," she said. "Not my uncle, and not my father." She glared at Snape, daring him to contradict her now.  
  
The grocer looked at her oddly, his brows drawing together, then shifted his gaze to Snape, who was staring at Hermione as though she had slapped him. What was she playing at? Blabbing their relationship to anyone who might be interested, or worse, confused enough by it to pursue it. She shook her head at him, hard. He frowned at her and dragged his attention away from her. "Pumpkin juice," he said again, to the grocer.  
  
The grocer looked at Snape for a long, considering moment. There was a strained silence. Snape knew he was assessing Snape's age against Hermione's age, and finding a tremendous discrepancy. _Robbing the cradle, eh, old man_. "Pumpkin juice?" said the grocer finally, slowly. "Never heard of it. Pumpkins now...season for them was in the autumn. None left."  
  
"Pumpkin juice. The juice from pumpkins. One drinks it." Snape tried to be clear.  
  
"Never. Heard. Of. It." The proprietor was equally clear.  
  
"Drop it," muttered Hermione, for Snape's ears alone. "Muggles don't drink it. Only our kind."  
  
"What else am I likely to be surprised by?" he growled. "What other stupid thing will you come up with? Should I _Obliviate_ the poor man after this?"  
  
"Just...let me do the shopping, please. You can carry, and pay."  
  
"As long as you stop drawing attention to our...relationship," he muttered, "and we will talk more about this when we get home, _little girl_." He followed her once more. She had almost bypassed the pears when he put his hand on her arm. "We need pears," he said.  
  
" _You_ need pears," she smiled. " _I_ don't like them." Nevertheless she chose a few and put them in his basket. For herself, she chose three slightly green bananas. Snape's lip curled.  
  
"Those aren't ripe."  
  
"I like them when they're astringent," she said.  
  
"They're sour?" he queried, perking up a bit. He liked sour things. "Maybe you should choose more than three, if they're sour. And lemon, lemon for the tea. Where are the lemons?"  
  
Eventually the basket was overflowing, and the proprietor was smiling again, patently pleased by the size of their purchase. Snape was not fooled. He fished out money -- Muggle money, shamelessly transfigured from knuts and galleons -- and paid for the goods, which the proprietor bagged for them.  
  
Outside the regular market, she reminded him that she was the shopper, and he was the keeper of the funds, and that he could push the cart. Snape glared at her, and she glanced around them before pulling his head down for an open-mouthed kiss that quickly swamped his objections.  
  
"There, _guardian_ of mine, your payment in advance for good behavior."  
  
The last of the shopping was quickly accomplished. Snape's only objection came at the meat counter, where he would not allow her to put red meat or pork into the cart -- only fish and chicken. After Snape paid, the two of them walked to the edge of the village laden with bags, to a sheltering copse of trees, and then apparated home to the cottage.  
  
Together, they put away the groceries. Snape charmed one shelf of a cupboard to be cold storage, for things requiring that. Together, they cooked a light supper in the fireplace, in a pan left by Angharad. Hermione forced him to try a radish or two, and he ate them, but he didn't like them. For dessert she sliced a pear and sat on his lap, feeding it to him a wedge at a time, sharing bites herself.  
  
"You said you didn't like them."  
  
"I don't, but neither do you like radishes," she said. "Fair is fair."  
  
Together, blissfully together.  
  
Blissful, until that first Malfoy falcon arrived from Lucius, late one afternoon as the sunlight slanted down through the larches outside Angharad's low stone wall, that separated her garden from the road leading to the village. They were having tea at the scarred wooden kitchen table, and both of them watched it swoop into the room, circling, to settle on the table in front of them.  
  
"Don't take it," Hermione said suddenly, voice shaky. "Just send it back."  
  
Snape was tempted, unbelievably tempted. His eyes met hers. _I could walk away. I could stay here forever, here with my love, and my Circle, and never be found. Never worry again. Never slave beneath the yokes of my two masters, Voldemort and Dumbledore._  
  
"Don't," she said again.  
  
"It's not only the two of us at stake, here," he said at last.  
  
Hermione's eyes closed. She breathed deeply, and said, "I know. I know." Her hands clenched into fists and she put them in her lap, out of his view.  
  
He removed the note from the falcon's leg. The bird departed immediately; no reply was expected.  
  
The note from Lucius was simple in the extreme. It said only, "Summoned." Snape's hand rasped over his slightly roughened chin. "I'm summoned," he told her.  
  
"When?"  
  
"I will go soon."  
  
Hermione rose and came around the table to him. "Now?"  
  
"Not now, but soon. Tonight." He blinked up at her as she stood next to him. She stared down at him, searching the depths of his eyes; for what, he was unsure. As she continued to stand there, studying, his brows drew together. "What? What are you thinking now?"  
  
She pressed her lips together tightly, drawing in a long, harsh breath, which seemed to steady her. "Make love to me before you go, Snape."  
  
The response of his body to this demand was instantaneous. He swallowed hard. His hands flew to her hips and snatched her close, so that he could press his face between her breasts. "Yes. Yes. I will make love to you, Hermione."  
  
She took his hand and led him to the bed, where she undressed him herself, slowly, carefully, with the most intense concentration as though she were marking each part of him indelibly on her memory, as if it would be the last time she ever saw him. She would not allow him to undress her, quickly shedding her own clothing.  
  
"I love you," he heard himself choking out, reaching for her nakedness. _Still so hard to say, no matter how true it is. The words are awkward, like stones in my mouth._  
  
"Make me believe it, Snape," she whispered, as his mouth came down. "I need to believe it."  
  
_A moment in time, weeks ago: "Cleansed." Her voice trembled and Severus saw her bite her lip to gain control.  
  
Severus was moved, despite himself. "Make me believe it, Hermione," he said huskily. "Say it again. I don't believe you, not yet."_  
  
The love was long, and slow, and deep. There was none of the playful frenzy of recent days; none of the laughter and clutching and gasping directions given from one or the other. Instead, when she opened her thighs and he slid between, there was a scalding moment of joining and he was afraid he would come in that instant, the sensation was so intense; but her eyes held his and he mastered his body, before moving on her, in her, through her, so deeply and carefully that after a time he was unsure where he ended and she began. He lay heavily atop her, but she did not seem to mind; in fact, if anything, she seemed to need him closer. He felt as though he were fucking her with his entire body, _all of it_ , moving slowly within and without. It was devastatingly intimate, more intimate, even, than when he fell asleep beside her. Her small breasts were crushed between them, yet he could feel her nipples, like hard, hot pebbles, rubbing against his own. Her gaze would not release his, and he could feel a spell of some sort rising from her, wreathing his body like smoke, covering him from head to foot. He found himself digging his toes into the mattress in order to brace and press himself deeper still, until he could feel himself touching bottom, reaching the small plum of her cervix.  
  
"What are you doing," he breathed, never ceasing the slow drag of his body against hers. "What magic is this?" Whatever it was, he could feel it sinking into his skin, glowing there for a moment before dissipating.  
  
"Warding you," she whispered back. "Someone must watch your arse, if you won't do it."  
  
It was spoken so seriously that he could not laugh, could not even smile. No one had ever cared enough for him before to want to ward him against evil, against hurt.  
  
"Where did you learn to do that?" He slowed his movements even more, taking himself down that one notch that would allow him to bring her to a climax before him. They were too close together for him to slip a hand between, no matter how slender and long his fingers were.  
  
"Ahhhh...Snape..." she spoke the sounds on an exhaled breath. The slow stroking was beginning to have an effect. He could feel the tension in her spiraling upwards, manifesting itself in the clenching of her fingers on his buttocks. "It's in an old book of spells," she told him now, her head falling back, her body trembling hard, then harder, until she disintegrated beneath him, pulling him with her into ecstasy.  
  
"Of course, _a book_ ," he sighed against her mouth, shuddering. "Yes, ward me."  
  
Not long after, she watched him from the bed, her knees drawn up beneath the blankets, her arms around her knees, her head resting on them. He dressed carefully, slowly, digging his silver mask and black robes out of the back of the armoire where he had hidden them. Hermione's eyes grew wide as she looked at the mask in his hand, and the Dark Mark, visible on the inside of his left arm.  
  
"You've never seen me like this," he said.  
  
"Professor, druid, Muggle man in bluejeans -- yes, those. But...but never...not this." She shivered and drew the blankets over her. "I don't like it."  
  
"Neither do I," he said. "But it must be done, there are others who matter more than I."  
  
"No, there aren't!" she cried, coming to her knees, naked on the bed, to clutch at the black robes and pull him close. "Don't go, Snape. He doesn't know where you are."  
  
Snape looked at her sternly. "Granger. Potter. Weasley. And now young Malfoy. Don't these matter?"  
  
She sat back on her heels and rubbed hard at her eyes. "I don't love them, not the way I love you."  
  
He drew his index finger beneath her eyes and gathered tears there, which he brought to his mouth, tasting this new part of her, the way he had wanted to taste her perspiration all those weeks ago, the first time in the Circle. The taste was bitter and salty. "I'll be back," he promised. "Just wait here. It will be several hours, but I'll be back." And he apparated, headed for the usual meeting place, a large and dark cellar somewhere in London.  
  
  


~*~

  
  
The meeting was excruciatingly boring, as always. Snape sat next to Lucius, even though the blond said not a word to him and glared through him with eyes of sharpest crystal. Voldemort paced in front of the group, shrieking out his plans and goals and hatred for two hours or more. He required that all the Death Eaters swear fealty to him anew, and caused them all pain by disrupting their Dark Marks with his knotted black wand as they knelt in front of him. Snape could see Lucius' jaw set in aggravation when Voldemort called special attention to him, by announcing that Draco would shortly be among their ranks, the first in a second generation of Death Eaters loyal to their Dark Lord. Lucius' eyes met his as Snape waited in line to pay his respects to Voldemort. There was no smile in them, still.  
  
When it was his turn, Snape knelt in front of Voldemort, who put his hand on Snape's head and shoved his forehead back, so that Snape's face was turned up. "What is this," he muttered. "I feel warding on you. Who has dared to ward you from me?"  
  
"It is only an experiment, my Lord," lied Snape. "I have been pondering how best for the Death Eaters to defend you and themselves in this coming battle."  
  
"Pondering, for all those weeks you ignored my summons, Snape?" The voice was chill and soft.  
  
"I was unavoidably out of reach," said Snape now. That much was truth. He doubted that even Voldemort could reach through the wards of a properly alive Circle. "I regret that very much, my Lord."  
  
Voldemort touched his wand to the Dark Mark on Snape's arm. Snape pretended it hurt, bending over it, rubbing it with his right hand. But actually, Hermione's warding was holding up well, and the touch of the black wand had little effect other than to burn slightly. "Away with you," muttered Voldemort. Snape filed back to his seat next to Lucius, who leaned to speak quietly.  
  
"I have held up my end of the bargain -- not divulging your trysts with your mudblood. Do your part -- help me keep my son from those hands and that black wand."  
  
When the meeting was over, and Snape had learned nothing new with regard to the battle plans for sometime in late spring, the Death Eaters began to Apparate away from the meeting site. Snape himself was ready to depart when Voldemort called his name. Snape turned, dreading what was next.  
  
"Snape. Potions Master Snape. Oh, no -- forgive me, I should say, ex-Potions Master Snape."  
  
Snape sighed. "I'll always be a Potions Master, my lord. Just not a Hogwarts teacher."  
  
Voldemort folded his arms. "I need you to explain to me why you are no longer at Hogwarts, Snape. I needed you there. I'm having to make do with the eyes of an irresponsible youth -- _Potter_ \-- and young Malfoy."  
  
"I...made an error in judgment," said Snape. "I was caught for it, and sacked."  
  
"What kind of error."  
  
There was no point in lying. Voldemort already knew; he was simply toying with Snape. "I slept with one of my students. More than once. And was caught."  
  
"Did the wench turn you in?"  
  
"No. She was willing. We were caught, as I said."  
  
"It is most unlike you to surrender to your baser desires, Snape."  
  
"I regret it," he replied.  
  
"There is also something...new. A barrier between us. Something I have never seen before."  
  
"Sir? A barrier?" Snape knew what Voldemort was talking about -- Lucius had prepared him, thankfully, but pretended to misunderstand. "I explained about the warding, my Lord."  
  
"Not your foolish warding, idiot. As you can see, it had little effect. No. I mean something else. I have summoned you many times these past months, yet you have not come at my calling. There is a noise, a whiteness, an energy I cannot push past."  
  
"I never heard your call, my lord, or I would surely have come."  
  
"That is what Lucius Malfoy says, as well. Snape, I need you to find and dissolve this barrier. And I need you to return to Hogwarts and continue in your critical role."  
  
Snape bowed. "I will do my best."  
  
"Don't fail. I am not pleased with the current arrangement."  
  
"I understand, my lord." Snape turned to leave, since the conversation appeared to be over.  
  
"And Snape...next time, your reward will be _Cruciatus_ , if you are disobedient again."  
  
"I understand, my lord," he said again. _Cruciatus. Always, and only. Any third year student could be more original than that, yet...it's still the most effective punishment we know. Lazy and uncreative of you, Voldemort._  
  
When he was released, Snape Apparated home, arriving in the dark bedroom. He stripped down to his boxers, tossing his Death Eater garb over an armchair. He slid into the bed, his hands groping for Hermione. She was not asleep in the bed.  
  
" _Lumos_ ," he said, and looked around him. Hermione was not in the room at all. "Shit," he said, startled. "Hermione?" He flung back the blankets and went into the parlor. Not there, either. He turned the corner into the kitchen, and there she was, finally, kneeling on the hearth, her head and upper body well into the fireplace, fluffy piles of soot all around her as she scrubbed at the stone walls and chimney. She had bespelled her wand to float behind her, giving her light: a trick of Flitwick's.  
  
Snape stared, his heart rising into his throat. Hermione seemed almost manic in her movements as she awkwardly yet swiftly scrubbed at the inside of the fireplace. Whenever a clump of soot fell and struck her arm, she would give a gasp and try to brush it away; but each time it left a dark streak, which she would attempt to wipe away, then scrape at with her fingernails, making a gasping noise of panic and revulsion. _Is this how it starts? Is it beginning again? Tell me it's not, it cannot still be happening, she's been so happy here, she's been so much better, she's been well, hasn't she?_  
  
"Merlin, Hermione -- what are you doing?"  
  
With a gasp, she sat upright and nearly struck her head on the stone at the front of the fireplace. "You're home!" she cried. "Are you hurt? Did he hurt you, after all those meetings you missed?"  
  
Snape shook his head, wearily. "It was not that sort of meeting. It was...boring. Hermione, why didn't you just use a charm to clean out the soot?"  
  
She looked a bit sheepish. "This nasty fireplace!" she cried out. "I...I...didn't think of using a charm." She wrapped her arms around her body, realized she was getting soot on her clothing, and held her arms away from herself awkwardly. "I guess...it...I really just...I need to know that it's _clean_. Arrrg!" She came out of the fireplace and moved to the sink, where she ran the hot water tap and pushed her arms beneath the steaming stream. Working angrily, she soaped herself well and rinsed. Snape, moving closer to brush soot from her hair, saw that she had scraped and nicked her hands and arms on the inside of the rough stone fireplace as well as scratching at the soot that dirtied them.  
  
"You're bleeding a little," he said, dabbing at the cuts with a towel.  
  
"The walls of the fireplace are very rough," she said, huskily. "Could you do a cleansing spell?" she asked him. "I think I probably have a lot of soot in my hair."  
  
Snape obliged. "Why aren't you in bed, Hermione? Why are you still awake?"  
  
"I couldn't sleep. You didn't really expect me to, did you?" Clean again, she flung herself against him and wrapped her arms around his neck. "You're home, you're safe. How did my warding do?"  
  
"Just...fine," he told her now, looking deep into her eyes. _She's panicking_ , he thought. _Almost desperate_. "Just fine, Hermione. It saved me from considerable pain when Voldemort touched my Dark Mark with his wand. Come back to bed now, where it's warm."  
  
Hermione was still draping herself bonelessly over him. "You're always telling me that, it seems," she said, drawing out each syllable and laughing faintly.  
  
Snape didn't like the eerie, scattered sound of her laugh, but told himself to ignore it. "Well will you listen -- and perhaps obey me -- for once?" he demanded softly, bending his head, finding her mouth, and then lifting her in his arms. He wanted her in bed; he would just take her there himself, instead of debating it endlessly.


	27. A Study in Contrasts: Red and Black and White

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains descriptions of self-mutilation and suicide. If you are disturbed by such things, please skip the later portions of this chapter.

  
"We have slaughtered  
In the garden of beauty  
Digging graves instead of planting  
Mercy for the crucified  
A bitter justice  
Begging eternity for love  
  
We're nothing  
We're everything  
  
I am nothing  
Yet I am everybody  
  
We're nothing  
And yet we are  
  
Wisdom lights up life's road  
  
I know you."  
  
\-- Movement I: Mercy. Alanis Morissette.  
  
  
  
The following two months were relatively peaceful. A blizzard that erupted in mid-February - two weeks after they had celebrated the Imbolc - forced the two of them to stay indoors for several days, making Hermione grateful for her wisdom in planning ahead and keeping a stock of canned goods. They spent it in slow, thorough love-making on the plaited rug in front of the fireplace; attempting to save Angharad's renovated garden from the blasting storm; concocting experimental potions made with the little storage of plants and chemicals they could extract from the materials they had in the cottage. In a moment of creativity, Hermione had even tried to convince Snape to do some Yoga.  
  
"We are in the middle of a blizzard," Snape hissed once she dragged him, growling and grumbling, to the small storage room she had emptied weeks ago so she could use it for her training. "No mediwizard in sight in case I get stuck looking like a bagel," he added. "What in great Merlin's beard are you trying to do to me, woman?"  
  
"I'm trying to introduce you to one of the healthiest, most consolidating forms of exercise," she informed him. "Yoga is known to relieve stress, tension, insomnia and physical pain. It brings greater clarity of mind, greater concentration and clearer awareness of being."  
  
Desperate now, Snape lowered himself to the thin mattress she conjured for him, eyes turned to the heavens as if praying for rescue. Crookshanks, awoken from his long drowse in front of the burning fire, was drawn to the room by the noises of conversation. Standing in the doorway, the half-Kneazle watched the two of them with a pair of big, yellowish eyes.  
  
Snape glared at her. "Your feline, too, thinks you are out of your mind."  
  
She rolled her eyes. "You're pathetic. Beside, Crook is a better Yogi than I. Come here, pug-face-" Hermione turned to the cat, making silly cooing noises. "Come show evil Potions Master Snape how flexible you are."  
  
Crook merely yawned, and crouching, turned to clean his rear end.  
  
"To show you what he really thinks of you and your idiotic propositions," Snape, sprawled on the mattress at her side, translated.  
  
She beamed at him. "I told you you two are going to be best friends. Now stop arguing and start doing as you're told."  
  
In the end, after more nasty comments followed by logical (and less logical, though of a more physical nature) arguments, Hermione discovered her lover wasn't molded out of the most flexible material. It appeared, then, that her plans for making love by the book (she intended to purchase the Kama Sutra the moment the blizzard abated) were permanently put off. On the other hand, what he lacked in flexibility, Snape usually compensated for in skill and competence.  
  
Lying in his arms a few hours later, with the wind hurling snowflakes against the cottage's stonewalls, he chuckled, and asked her whether she was disappointed.  
  
She shook her head. "Hardly."  
  
Being locked together brought out other, negative emotions as well, as they were both scathing individuals; both striving towards their own ends, and so, bound, in a sense, to hurt each other. An unbiased observer would have said she ought to be the more considerate of the two, because she was younger, sweeter, and most importantly, a Gryffindor. Amusing, she thought, as it was most definitely a mistake, though in a way, they would be right: one of her Gryffindor qualities was her frequent bluntness.  
  
Harry was sweet and delicate, and so, she treated him gently. With Harry she was careful, even though forthrightly-blank - sometimes forthrightly-cruel- might have suited her more. Snape, however, was someone she could poke her fingers into his ribs: he was un-fragile, un-frail, if only because she needed him to be. His strength meant she could afford herself some weakness; whether the kind demonstrated by mere pettiness, whether by sinking boneless, rib-less into his arms - _funny, wasn't it? That a **woman** should lack her rib. But then, it seems like ever since the days of Genesis men have been working to fix that, assuring our sex's dependency._  
  
It was utterly selfish on her part, and did often torment her, but Snape seemed to tolerate her nastiness, as well as her contemporary breakdowns, and if he was ever hurt, he hardly ever let it show.  
  
The blizzard was also something she could utilize. Being confined to the house, he was unable to run from her if he didn't like the turn of their conversations. Hermione had indeed put it into use by finally cornering him, asking about the one thing he never told her about. Haunted by the knowledge ever since they left Malfoy Manor, she was determined to confront Snape with what Lucius Malfoy had inadvertently revealed to her.  
  
"What was Lily Evans to you?" she inquired one day as they were sitting in front of the fireplace.  
  
Snape had been sitting in his mentor's old armchair, with Crookshanks - whom he had formed a tentative treaty - curled in his lap. Hermione, at his feet, was pretending to read a book, sometimes reaching her hand to pet Crookshanks.  
  
The stretchy, domestic silence; scented of logs burning in the hearth and feline hairs on worn-out fabric, had shrunk, crystallized and fractured, the moment she uttered the words.  
  
"Snape," she said, the single word seeming to echo in the narrow room.  
  
Above her, his face turned blank. Not a classroom's glare, she noted, but a hollow, empty expression. "I don't want to talk about it."  
  
"I do."  
  
"You want many things."  
  
She nodded. "So you would say. Why won't you talk about her?"  
  
Jaw tightening, he leaned to pick up the Herbology essay was formerly reading. "She's dead. She's unimportant."  
  
"If she was unimportant," Hermione reasoned, "you wouldn't mind talking about her. I'd risk sounding like Professor Dumbledore, but it appears to me those are the important things we don't talk about. You never mentioned her." Hermione frowned, forcing down a lump of irrational fear. "She must be grievously important. I am almost afraid of a dead woman. I certainly am jealous of her."  
  
"Stupid girl."  
  
"I should really hex you for calling me that," she murmured. "But I'm too curious and alert by now. I suppose I'd simply have to let you live until you told me about her."  
  
"Well," he said coldly. "It seems like I'm destined to live a long life." At that, he put the Herbology book aside, removed an aggravated Crookshanks from his lap, and stalked into the bedroom.  
  
Dinner was a gloomy affair. Snape perceived their latest state of controversy as a permission to revert to his diet of fruits and porridges, and since there were no fruits and no porridges, sat in front of her and ate nothing at all.  
  
"You are being absurd," she told him. "This omelet is palatable. And the salad will be good for you, too. I used our last fresh vegetables to make it. It's rich in vitamins."  
  
The man across the table looked grim as ever. "The omelet has onions in it," he stated. "I don't like onions."  
  
She glared at him. "And the salad?"  
  
"Tomatoes. I hate tomatoes."  
  
"Oh, let me guess," she rebutted angrily. "They are too... _red_? Too much like the Gryffindor red, perhaps?"  
  
"Yes." And flicking his wand, he sent his empty plate back to the cupboard together with the cutlery, leaving her alone to finish her dinner. Crying out in frustration, she threw her full glass of orange juice at his retreating form, some of her anger slaked as the cup hit the wall, shattering into pieces. Cleaning it later, she forsook her wand, and using a wet towel, gathered the small splinters of broken glass. A tiny fragment bruised the pad of her thumb, making her flinch, and she brought the sore thumb into her mouth. A frown on her face, she sucked away the scant amount of blood oozing from the wound. Sour-sweet, familiar and comforting.  
  
Sleeping with her back to him that night, Hermione dreamed strange dreams about a girl with her hair the colour of wildfire: the girl was tall, about twelve or thirteen inches taller than Hermione, with a somewhat long, lovely face. Her eyes - deep, green and tantalizing - were big and serious, accompanied by long, aristocratic nose and a country girl's mouth. A mouth that told secrets of stolen kisses, and snogging in the dark.  
  
Most of all, Hermione was fascinated with the girl's arms. Long, creamy and pale, her arms were lean, and yet bearing a hint of baby fat under their silky length. Her skin, which was soft and almost glowing with moisture, had the faintest, most delectable creamy hue: a colour one can see where an oyster's slightly pouted lips spread, to allow a better look into its velvety interior.  
  
Hermione had never seen a picture of Lily Evans Potter: she knew Harry kept an album with his parents' photographs in it someplace, but in truth, was never really interested in his mother's appearance - up till now. Even so, once the girl with her locks the colour of wildfire appeared in her dream, Hermione had doubtlessly recognized her for Lily Evans.  
  
The first dream was rather banal: young Lily and young Snape studying in Hogwarts library; raven and reddish heads bent over an Arithmancy text, until the ever-present presence, wallflower-hook of a librarian shooed them out. The light which was assembling behind them - gathering back inside the closing doors of the Hogwarts' library - had been dimming the fires that seemed to be always burning in Lily's hair. The boy, who had grown to be Hermione Granger's lover, was fascinated with that hair, in the same way Hermione was fascinated with Lily's arms, and with the man's hands.  
  
All of a sudden, boy-Snape cornered girl-Lily in a darkened nook. "Let me kiss you, Lily," he asked her.  
  
His companion seemed amused, yet her eyes were alight. _Can you see her craving for you? I wonder if you can_.  
  
"Why?" teased girl-Lily.  
  
"Why not?" the boy cocked his head.  
  
Hermione was unsure when, exactly, this dream melted into the next, but was positive that even though the following dream began relatively at the same point - with her two brain-puppets standing in a darkened hallway - this was another dream altogether, one or two R.E.M's away from the first. This hallway, for example, was different, and Hermione had instantly recognized the marble satyr and the velvet curtain behind which the two youths where hiding.  
  
Planted in the shadows, she moved a little closer, frustrated to have her view of the scene narrowed and delimited by an empirical body. Foggily aware of the fact she was dreaming and this scene, she tried to extend her peripheral sight, and failed. _Follow the path of the white rabbit, then, she mused_.  
  
Attentive, she tried to capture any particular noises, unsurprised in the least to hear the hoarsened breath and the wet, slobbery sounds of snogging. On a whim, she lifted her arm, checking on the garment she wore, her eyes widening to see she was wearing Snape's black school robe which hung past the ends of her hands in a ridiculous manner. _To remind me I am a child, spying on her elders, who happened to do whatever they did more then twenty years ago, or merely because I am put in his place?_  
  
Aggravated, she followed the noises, over the satyr, behind the red, velvet draperies, where a long limbed boy was snugged between a redheaded girl's thighs, his lips locked with her open mouth, and her arms; her unblemished, graceful, impeccable arms, curled around his neck. Burying her hands in Snape's hair, Lily Evans undulated under his body. Legs wound around his pelvis, she pressed her center to his, gasping as a wave of pleasure shot through her body, and arched so that her nipples too, would be rubbed against his torso. Then, with sharp pleasure undoing her, she opened her eyes, to meet the stare of the short, bushy haired girl who watched her venomously from the other side of the hallway.  
  
Lily Evans didn't say a thing. For a moment, her eyes - which seemed to be a replication of Harry's fixed in a feminine face - merely wavered sorrowfully: huge, soulful and dead, at the girl who envied her after so long. Then she was an alive, reckless and possessive fifteen-year-old Gryffindor, and recognized full well the challenge in the other girl's eyes. _Not cunning_ , Hermione concluded, _but sharpness. Not sweet, but mellow; but soft. Not compelling, but bewitching. A woman to be worshiped and not a pliant, elastic girl. Not me, but her_.  
  
The words, whispered in the privacy of her head, were somehow tugging the rims of her peripheral sight, pulling and reshaping it. The air around her became pungent and cold, though she had no longer a substantial mouth by which to taste it, or skin, for the wind to caress frostily. The two figures were still holding onto each other, but Lily's eyes were now closed and her face was no longer the face of a fifteen-years-old girl, but the face of a young woman. One who was glowing with Snape's touch. Her expression was that of anguish and splendor: a martyr Lily crucified on a New Testament cross, God rising within her when Snape's hands moved on her skin. Then he moved away: briefly, harshly, as his hand found the curve of her pregnant belly, rounded with James Potter's child.  
  
"Severus, I-" she stammered, her eyes filled with tears, but he wouldn't listen. _Ah, Lily Potter_ , Hermione thought bitterly. _Did you not know there is no surrendering to Severus Snape, and no unbending him? Did you not know it is always about Severus Snape and his petty egocentric self?_ Apparently, she did, as Lily did not waste her time convincing the man both of them loved to listen to her. All she did was choose the sharpest knife, aiming it perfectly to cause the gravest pain, and twisting.  
  
He left, to tend to his own severe injuries. Hermione felt the familiar pressure in her lower abdomen. _I do not blame you, Snape, but I do wonder if you ever knew that she bled even worse_.  
  
This thought caused the lucid dream-images to alter. Like slides in a home projector; shifting with a small click so that an entirely different picture could pour into the formerly white screen. Snape was standing in front of her, twenty-five years old or so, ankles sunken in a deep, distorting fog. His long, black hair was waving in an unseen wind; ends immersing in the mist. Somehow, the sharpened contrasts of his skin against his hair, the contrast of his entity against any other beings seemed faint; feeble and glassy in this other actuality. Lifting her hand to remove a stray lock of hair from her face, she found the hair to be red and bright - wildfire-red - and the hand to be coated with creamy, shell-white skin.  
  
He called her Lily, and there was such longing, such desperation in his voice that this body, which was Lily Potter's, almost collapsed under the weight of its two occupants combined sorrow: Hermione's clenching its womb, while Lily's kindled the soft tissues draping its throat and the cavity of its heart, turning it all to ashes.  
  
"Hello, Severus," she could hear herself saying in a voice that was not her own. "Why would you wish to hurt me so? Please go away and let me be."  
  
Snape's eyes turned black with sorrow, and while Lily was pained, Hermione was fascinated with the nakedness of expression.  
  
"I never wished to hurt you, Lily-" they heard him deny, and out of Lily's bowels, she could feel laughter rising: bitter, galling, defiant. For all along, he did nothing but hurt her. Even now that she was strolling in the ever green meadows of Tir Nan Og, he would come here to break her heart. And Hermione, staring at him out of Lily's emerald eyes, knew that even in her death, Severus Snape missed Lily Evans, who was no longer his, no longer alive, no longer to be had by anyone.  
  
She felt drained and sore after waking up, as if a backlog of lactic acid was being wrenched from her joints; slightly dizzy and downright annoyed that her body was uncooperative. She tried to meditate, but her concentration was constantly broken, the comfortable quiescence of the house disrupted by Snape who prowled the cottage like a caged animal.  
  
Slamming doors and shifting pieces of furniture; tossing obscure items as he went through the contents of a dresser and cursing under his breath when he was displeased with his findings; the man was making a pest of himself. Running out of patience, she rolled her mattress and exited her training room with the intention of facing him. As she anticipated, the damn man was flipping through some of his potions texts, not even pretending to read it as he scowled at Crookshanks.  
  
Leaning forward, Hermione seized the book, putting it back on the shelf where it belonged  
  
Sticking her hands in the pockets of her jeans, she turned to look at Snape. "All right. This nonsense has been going far enough for me. Lily Evans Potter is not even a ghost. Why is it, then, she lives with us in this house?"  
  
She expected Snape to rise from his chair and stalk out of the room. She expected him to glare and yell at her or for his face to turn blank. She did not, however, expect him to sink, beaten, into the armchair. He looked distanced- anticipating, perhaps, the next blow from a father who no longer lived. A man engulfed in his ghosts, she realized: a man who surrounded himself with his ghosts, unable to either let go, or to dispose of them.  
  
"Do you love her more than you love me?" she asked at last.  
  
Snape angled an eyebrow. "Lily is dead. I _loved_ her."  
  
Hermione shrugged her shoulders, tired and defeated. "How dead can she be for you if you can't even talk about her?"  
  
"I am now, aren't I?"  
  
Exhausted, she sank to the carpet at his feet, resting her head on his knee. Lean and sinewy, she could feel the bony structure of his knee-cap under her ear. The worn-out cloth of his jeans pressed its softened texture onto the side of her face. "I… I don't mind it so much," she said at last. "Not anymore. Don't talk about her if it pains you so. I don't know, perhaps some wounds are better left sealed, septic as they may be. Puncturing them we would achieve nothing but moving the infection into our circulation and be much worse…"  
  
His hand reached to stroke her bird's-nest mane, fingers interlacing in between wild honey locks. Touching his fingertips to her scalp in a slow, absentminded massage, she felt their heat permeating through her skin. Heat that - reaching a certain part of her soul - converted into molecules of complacency: small enough to stream in her blood and thus, reach every spot in her body.  
  
He sighed. "I'm not sure of it. Perhaps I don't talk simply because I don't remember how. Or because I have never learned. This is not to say I am better off not talking. Just that I never did. And you are the same."  
  
She nodded. "Then would you tell me about her?"  
  
"What do you want to know about Lily?"  
  
Her finger trailed slow, lazy circles over his left knee. "Not her…" she said at last, "but you. I want to know what she was to you. Why did you fall in love with her, and why are you still in love with her memory… I want to know was she better than I in the sack, and did you love her more than you love me. I heard the rumors, so I won't ask you whether she was prettier- I suppose she was…" Hermione's voice dissolved against his knee.  
  
"Is that _all_ you want to know?" he asked her, somewhat amusedly.  
  
"Now you're mocking me."  
  
She heard his tongue clicking against his palate. "Affectionately so."  
  
"Would you answer me then?"  
  
Snape sighed. "Yes, I will answer you." He was silent a while, and she waited for him to speak again.  
  
"You want to know about me," he said at last, "and not Lily, but to tell you about me I _must_ tell you about Lily. And I must tell you about _you_ , as well."  
  
Rising a little, she attempted to look at him, but Snape only shook his head and gently stroking her hair, used his fingertips to hold her in place. Rested against his lap, she couldn't meet his eyes. _So_ , she thought. _It cannot be pleasant if you won't look at me_.  
  
She was grateful to notice his hand was still gentle on her head, and not tense. Tucking her hands around his legs, she managed to slide them beneath his thighs, between the cotton of the jeans and the fabric of the armchair, where there was warmth.  
  
"Lily was, like you, not entirely Gryffindor," he began. "There was an edge of Ravenclaw to her, as there is to you. Some... sharpness, some bitterness, brilliance." There was a slight chuckle from him. "And before you ask, since I can hear you drawing breath for a question, Hermione - yes, I may call you stupid girl, _for such you are_ , but you are a brilliant girl as well. There, now - your ego has been suitably inflated. Lily was never the girl that you are. Lily was a woman, always. That is what I did not understand until it was too late. Women... women need men to have emotions. Need to share them. And I- because... because of my- upbringing, I believed it was not safe to have emotions. It was _certainly_ not safe to share them, not safe to show them."  
  
Now his hand did tense on her head. "It's still not safe," he murmured. "Look where it got us, for me to admit my feelings for you- to act on them. No job for me, no education for you: our -friends left behind in ruins. Little Gryffindor that you are, I would not expect you to be able to hide your feelings more than I would ever expect you to be able to betray a friend to save your own life, but I- I could have done that, I should have done that. I should _never_ have touched you."  
  
Cold with the quiet resolve in his voice, she struggled free of his restraining hand and stared up at him. His pupils were huge; that thin rim of wild grey hardly even a memory in his eyes. "I wanted you to touch me," she whispered.  
  
"I knew that," Snape told her. His head fell back against the armchair, leaving his white throat exposed. "And the lesson of Lily - the lesson I learned too late - was that to touch is to wound, but not to speak of love. To love and remain silent- is to kill." He met her eyes again. "Do you see? Is it enough?" He opened his arms. "Come into my lap, Hermione. What follows is worse."  
  
"How could it be worse?" She asked, creeping into his gaunt, sinewy arms and settling with her head in the angle of his neck and shoulder. "You never told her you loved her...but you told me. You told me so that I could have that knowledge, and not be destroyed by its lack." Her lips, seemingly hot and feverish, found the cool porcelain that was his throat, and began nuzzling his hair aside.  
  
"I did." His hand was idly playing with her hair now. "Because I was silent, she had to hurt me - both of us, perhaps - in order to free herself. And so -- she went -- to... _Potter_." He stopped, taking a sharp breath. "She had Potter's son. Had I been braver, it would have been my son she bore, my life she made complete. She chose Potter, not for love, but for hatred. Because she knew I hated him the most." His other hand clenched for a moment on her hips and ribs. _And now_ , she thought, _I know why you hate Harry so, and yet why you have saved his life, why you cannot help caring. For her sake_.  
  
Snape gave a faint chuckle. "Are you better than Lily _in the sack_? I will say you are different, and of a certainty I know your body better." He turned her mouth to his and kissed it deeply before continuing. "Foolish girl. To have given up so much for your vile Potions Master. I am not the youth I was then, so there is no comparison to be made between you and Lily. Where you are different though- in you there is a determination, an unwillingness to compromise. You drove me to drink, you drove me to fuck you, you drove me to confess my feelings, in a way Lily never did." Then his eyes narrowed, and he reached his hand to cup her face.  
  
"Lily was realistic," Snape added with a note of hollow, pristine sorrow to his voice. "You, however, are a true Gryffindor in your unrealism. You would burn yourself first, then everyone else, in order to change the world. To get what you want. Sometimes you would tell yourself the world would be a better place if you got what you want- that your wish and the world's becoming a better place goes hand in hand. That's why you're more dangerous than any ambitious Slytherin. Because we would never fool ourselves to think so. Yet this is hardly my point. You have me, and Lily hasn't, because she wouldn't pay the price of dealing with the half autistic youth I was. She wouldn't burn herself. I do believe that- as an adult, I am easier to reach- but look at the price you paid to get us here; I do not regret it-" he said, seeing the angry flash in her eyes, "but Lily wouldn't. Lily would have waited. Lily would not have let herself be consumed- by love or by any other emotion. She would take care of herself. This is the difference between you two, Hermione: I wish you would have taken care of yourself as well."  
  


* * *

  
  
Both of them were calmer once the blizzard had quieted. As for Hermione- she felt that perhaps, something of the ever-white mirage stretching for miles and miles over the Cotswold Hills might seep into her soul, granting her with some of its tranquility.  
  
Putting on her Muggle cardigan, she told Snape she would be taking a walk, taking his grunt as a yes. He was busy in the kitchen at the time, bent over several pots where he attempted to breed a few exotic plants in the moderated heat of their home.  
  
With her wand in her hand, she defrosted parts of the road where the snow hadn't yet melted into a passable depth, happy to note some of the more used paths were already cleared by the Muggle authorities. She had been strolling idly for a while, drinking in the cold frozen air, her cheeks flushed from the cold. Miles of moving air and open land surrounded her body from each direction instead of confining walls, and the knowledge made her calm; excited; dizzy.  
  
Unintentionally, she found herself roaming to the spot Snape referred to as Angharad's circle. While in her eyes the cottage was theirs, Hermione had still thought of the Oxfordshire's Stonehenge as Snape's mentor's circle, just as the Stones at Hogwarts belonged to him. She had often wondered about the woman: not the way Lily Evans haunted her, but in a placid, more pensive manner. _I ask myself - if not for her, would he have been able to reach for me, and had he met her earlier, wouldn't he reach for Lily?_ Hermione frowned. _I can hear you chuckle, old woman. What is it that you know, and I don't?_  
  
Sprawling on the clear snow in the middle of the circle, Hermione looked at the greyish stones that encircled her in an ancient, motionless dance. Lucid, almost bluish wintry sunrays played over her face, and she enjoyed their light warmth on her skin. _Sometimes I am amazed at us, women, that we would so easily play pawns for a man_ , she thought at the memory of the old lady. _Not you, you were probably stronger than that, an accidental pawn, I'd say. Probably had more in your life than being Severus Snape's pawn- just a phase for you, didn't even guess you were- though… you were clever - you ought to have known how important you were to him. But me, and Lily Evans…  
  
Snape was wrong_, she decided. _Didn't Lily give up her life for him? Because of him? Marrying a man who was good for her indeed, but whom she didn't love: a man who wasn't the love of her life - just to pain him? Wasn't she just…_ Hermione screwed up her face in concentration, wasn't she just resuming her position as a pawn by doing that? Manipulating him, yes, but more than that, living her life according to his whims-, if not directly, then indirectly? _What is it about love; about women- what is it about this man, which makes us throw our lives away? You have no answers for me, do you, Angharad? Is it because you were stronger? No, you're just like him, wanting me to find my own answers.  
  
Yes,_ she thought, shifting into a sitting position. _I know your kind, always speaking in riddles_. Noting the Stones' shadows on the snow, Hermione realized that the hour was growing late. Snape would be worried.  
  
Regretting to leave the circle, she moved to her feet, dusting snow from her jeans and cardigan. She would be back there with Snape, to hear more about the Druids and their rites, to practice, chant and learn: she would be back there on her own, to feel the sun kissing her eyelids. The thought was somewhat reassuring. With that in mind, she began making her way back towards the cottage.  
  
The sun warmer now, that it was almost noon; some of the snow melting into slushy puddles under her booted feet. She would take off the boots the moment she was home and cast a cleansing charm on the pair, she thought venomously. Using her magic to dispose of mud was one of the things she was unable to do at her parents' house, and it was a relief to be able to do it here.  
  
Nearing the cottage, she thought she saw some strange addition to the slated, snow-covered roof. A thick mess of what seemed to be prickly shrubs and woody plants bearing sharp edges, were arranged into what seemed to be a nest. The said nest was located not far away from the chimney.  
  
Stepping closer, Hermione narrowed her eyes. Inside the nest sat a thin, mournful looking bird, bearing a slight resemblance to a vulture. Horrified, she gave a sharp, startled cry. The noise brought Snape out at once.  
  
Storming out of the door, he caught her standing in front of the house, and had immediately followed her gaze. "All that fuss about that damnable Augurey!" he roared once he realized what she was staring at. "The idiot bird has been here ever since the storm abated and now you decide you wish to screech like Trelawney!"  
  
She turned to him, startled and aggravated at his sudden appearance. "Do you have a bat's ears?" she asked angrily. "And why wouldn't I be worried? Have you ever known an Augurey to nest on a roof? Or build a nest so deeply into winter??"  
  
Snape gave her his notorious classroom scowl. "First of all, Miss Granger, you should keep in mind we are not just any people, but wizards and this is not any bird, but a magical bird. Secondly, I would remind you of the storm, which probably drove this ridiculous bird away from its nest and threw its life into chaos. It was looking for warmth and protection, and found it here, in this well guarded house. Thirdly, and most importantly," he said in his scathing, lecturing tone, "you would be better to remember that the Augurey's distinctive cry is not, as it was once believed, a death omen. Nevertheless, its cry does foretell rain. Now, after I told you nothing you didn't already know, or couldn't think of yourself-" he sighed, "I would like you to come over here so I can see everything is all right with you."  
  
She nodded tiredly, tumbling into his arms, feeling ridiculous to be so alarmed over one ugly bird. Pawns, yes- they might be pawns to his king, but it was a rather feudalistic system if it was to be so. Guards and protection for their fiefdom.  
  


* * *

  
  
February rolled slowly into March, snow melting to expose patches of fresh, savory grass. Rain had been watering the ground, and soaked their Druid garments as they made their way to Angharad's circle. Now, that March was in, with the Imbolc celebrations behind them, they prepared for the Alban Eiler: the Vernal Equinox.  
  
There, strolling the winding paths of Oxfordshire County with Snape at her side, his clear, beautiful voice simmering around and inside her like glowing heat from a fireplace, she thought that perhaps she had finally captured something of that elusive quality that was exultation. With him, her mind as well as her body was free to rise, free to explore, and roam and marvel. Donna's slightly nasal, preaching voice was only a dim echo in her head, and her father, even though she had sometimes terribly missed him, was something she refused to think about. With her condition apparently improved, Snape, too, was willing - even though reluctantly - to drop the subject. Some boils, she knew, were better left septic and untouched.  
  
Snape was still summoned by Voldemort every once in a while: those Death Eaters gatherings were probably the only thing that touched her little bubble of bliss. Snape and she had their disputes, which one of them would end at last. She by tempting him with sex: he by confounding her over a verbal fencing. Then they would talk it out, or they wouldn't. She was right, once; by saying they were cut to fit each other's measures. Flawed perfectly to suit each other. Both brilliant and immature and mature and excessively stupid in their hearts' affairs. On those nights when he'd answer Voldemort's summons, though, she would lie cold and lonely in their bed, planning to strangle Malfoy's bird the next time it breached the intimacy of their lives carrying its Job's message. Above all, she would wonder what it was about her, that she couldn't grab whatever happiness life had offered her and cling to it, accepting the good with the bad, without being thrown off her footing wherever the delicate balance had been somehow violated.  
  
What was it, really, which made her so different from other people, sharpening and amplifying emotions until they were sometimes unbearable- what was it she lacked - perhaps - the tools that were supposed to help her cope with the burden of knowing he was away, and at risk. The needle to stitch this great void, before she would succumb to the nothingness. What was it about her, which made her incapable of _living_ properly? Was there a _right_ method to living? Sometimes she thought it to be a shame that no book could teach you how to do it; things would be much easier.  
  


* * *

  
  
It had been a cozy evening. Snape was once again tending to his pots, with an observant Crookshanks recumbent on the kitchen table where the pots were placed - probably expecting to be tended to as well. Hermione was cooking dinner (it appeared that Snape knew how to cook only the things he liked to eat. The rest he burnt. She suspected he did it spitefully).  
  
All the three of them were disturbed when a dim knock was heard at the frost-coated windowpane. She cursed inwardly as Snape rose, letting in Malfoy's falcon and gently releasing the parchment attached to the bird's claw. It flew away just as it came, never delaying to check whether a treat might be offered for its service. Snape closed the window behind it.  
  
"Can we at least dine together?" she asked him coldly, hearing him sigh.  
  
"Hermione, _don't_."  
  
Her lips tightened. "I can't help it, Snape. I don't like it when you go there." The same familiar emptiness settled in her abdomen, making her light, making her movements swift and accurate.  
  
"You know I _must_ go there."  
  
"No," she shook her head. "I know you choose to go there."  
  
"Is that what aggravates you?" he asked furiously. "That I favour the common welfare of the Wizarding World over protecting you from a few hours of distress?"  
  
"That was uncalled for and doesn't merit a response," she answered him, although deep in her heart, his words stung. _Those are not a few hours of distress that you'd be preventing me, she thought, but few hours of sheer hell. I meant it when I said I don't ever want to be there again_.  
  
Snape uttered a loud sigh, levitating the pots off the kitchen table. "What is it, then?"  
  
"Nothing," she murmured. "It's nothing."  
  
"Fine!" He sprang to his feet. "I won't coax you into speaking. This method; intentionally avoiding a subject so that I would coo you into a conversation, is foolish and immature, and I've had enough of your childishness for one night. Have a charming evening, Hermione. I have some prior business to take care of as you surely know. Goodbye." And with that, he Accio-d his cloak and stormed out of the cottage.  
  
"Fuck you!" Crying, she groped for the nearest dish, which happened to be an empty china bowl, and flung it at the closing door. It smashed into small slivers on the floor, causing a surge of energy to climb up her body as the power invested in hurling the dish rushed back at her. She was slightly heady.  
  
The sound of the china crushing against the flagstones kept ringing in her ears, mixing with the vile scent of cooking food diffusing from the pots on the stove. Raising her wand, she extinguished the fire, then, with an additional flick, dispatched of the pots' contents. Her appetite was all gone. Nevertheless, the smell… the contagious, heavy, tacky smell: permeating her clothes, into her hair and skin. One by one, she opened the kitchen's windows, then the living room's windows. Done airing the house, she hurried to the bathroom, locking herself inside.  
  
A moment later she was inside the bathtub, where - after washing herself with the newly installed shower head - she scraped her hands. Ruthless, she worked the soap into her skin; soaping her hair, and then repeating the process, until every inch of her body was clean from the scent of food. _Sick, Granger. You are permanently, and un-blissfully sick_. With that thought in mind, she limped out of the bathroom, shivering at the sudden chill. But at least it smelled of rain and grass and not of food and Snape.  
  
Wrapping her hands around her body - scraping; sore as it hadn't felt for months - she stumbled into the bedroom, where it still smelled of _him_. The thought made the metaphorical incision open and bleed again. She wanted to cry. She wanted her skin to stop hurting. She wanted to be able to give her feelings a corporeal shape- one that would be recognized by _normal_ human beings- people who knew how to live, and not only their shadows: she and Harry and the likes of them, who couldn't even summon tears when they needed them, who couldn't find their way out of the cupboard unless there was someone to guide them into the light. Yes, she reflected bitterly. _This is the difference between me and Lily Evans. That Lily was capable, and I am unfit. This is the REAL different between us, Snape_.  
  
Why go on? She thought tiredly. She was never going to make it. Something would always come and topple her; something would always cause her to stumble. Even Snape, who was her umbilical cord to normalcy, had sometimes hurt her beyond every possible measure. She was twisting things, yes; it was surely not his fault that she was consistently overreacting, but that was how she was made, now wasn't she? Programmed to react disproportionately. Programmed to suffer. Why not end it here and now?  
  
Approaching the night-table at his side of the double bed, Hermione sank to her knees on the cold floor, opening one drawer after another until she found what she was seeking. The scalpel she chose was thin, lengthy and dangerously sharp; much sharper than anything she used on herself before. She supposed it would fit her current purposes, though.  
  
Looking at the clock, she saw it was almost 23:00. It seemed that she had been dawdling for a while. Hopefully, tonight's would be a long meeting.  
  
Crawling inside the covers, she spelled her wand to hover above, giving her light. Naked; she noted there was no sleeve to roll up, slightly amused to be noticing such a thing. The light from the wand flickered upon the blade as she lifted the scalpel, emphasizing its lethal sharpness. Pressing it to her left wrist, she located the blade over the point where two bluish lines crossed each other, creating a junction of a sort, reminding her of another, long forgotten junctions. Behind the two distant hills of Cair Paraval, perhaps a literary reflection of the little prince's two mounts, the words slipped off the parchment: St Exupery's pilot flew into the darkness and there was only oblivion. Sweet, milky oblivion.  
  
Such oblivion, though, might not be easy to reach. Her former cuts were always shallow, and even when she pressed the dislocated razor blades she usually used for this purpose into her skin, slashing a vein with a blunt blade was a very difficult job. Nevertheless, she suspected that using a Potions Master's scalpel was going to be different.  
  
Taking one deep breath of Snape's fragrance before the scent of blood would fill her nostrils, Hermione adjusted the scalpel's handle in her hand, and pressed the blade into her skin. There was no pain at first, only the sharp, familiar sting of metal cutting into flesh. Fascinated, she watched this knife, this blade, sink deeper into her wrist, almost as if she was cutting through warmed butter.  
  
The whole process didn't take more then few, brief seconds. Flicking out the blade, she watched - not tiny drops of blood oozing from a shallow wound - but wild, beautiful gushes, streaming down her wrist; trickling along the reddened skin of her forearm; falling in big, fleshy drops on the white linen. As if her wrists were crying, or spurting thick, red semen into a gasping lovers' bed. _Lovely_ , she thought as the pain - finer and stronger than any she had felt upon cutting herself before - hit her, pulsating straight from the wound in her arm into every spot in her body. _Absolutely beautiful_. And with the pain came the tears and she was no longer arid and dusty, but damp, saline and soluble. And with that, she turned to take care of her second wrist.


	28. Blood and Circuses

_who's most afraid of death? thou  
art of him  
utterly afraid, i love of thee  
(beloved) this  
  
and truly i would be  
near when his scythe takes crisply the whim  
of thy smoothness. and mark the fainting  
murdered petals. with the caving stem.  
  
But of all most would i be one of them  
  
round the hurt heart which do so frailly cling . . . .  
i who am but imperfect in my fear  
  
Or with thy mind against my mind, to hear  
nearing our hearts' irrevocable play --  
through the mysterious high futile day  
  
an enormous stride  
(and drawing thy mouth toward  
  
my mouth, steer our lost bodies carefully downward)  
  
  
\--" who's most afraid of death? thou "  
  
\-- e.e.cummings_  
  
  
  
 _"Like this." Severus demonstrated yet again the correct sweep of the wand tip, with the butt of the wand unmoving. "It's that circular motion of the very end that clears away the frost from the window."  
  
"It's more fun to breathe on it," said Hermione, doing so, melting away the complicated frost ferns and fractal flowers that had grown there overnight. "Or, to write...these...words..." and her fingertip etched her credo: "Severus loves Hermione."  
  
"Foolish girl," said Severus. "Don't call me Severus."  
  
"It's your name, isn't it? You call me Hermione."  
  
"No one calls me Severus anymore."  
  
"Headmaster Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall do."  
  
"I've asked them not to, but they don't listen." He scowled. "Nor do you, it seems."_  
  
Snape wakened abruptly from his doze when Lucius' elbow prodded him in the side. He made no sound upon wakening; it seemed his innate sense of self-preservation was still functional. He slid a glance to Lucius, who was watching him sidelong. He had gradually returned to Lucius' good graces, after convincing Voldemort a couple of summonings past that Draco did not make a good window into Dumbledore's plans at Hogwarts, since the Headmaster would not be likely to share plans with a student. Snape continued to assure Voldemort he would find a way back into Hogwarts as well. Snape encouraged Voldemort to continue trying to see through Potter's eyes, knowing that Potter would go to Dumbledore if he detected the Evil Serpent Wizard's presence. The prat's scar would surely alert him.  
  
His memory-dream of an early morning during the winter's only blizzard clung to his mind. His thoughts turned again to Hermione, and the sound of crockery smashing behind him as he left for this summoning. His lover had a temper, certainly. He smiled to himself, thinking about the intense pleasure of having fiery make-up sex with her when he got home. Normally he made love to her before leaving for a summoning, and then she would ward him against Voldemort's baser impulses towards pain and humiliation; but of late she had grown fretful and more anxious than usual over his departures, and this time they had argued. He was ready to return, even to her shrewish comments.  
  
This summons was different. Voldemort seemed to be settling on a firmer time period; for some strange reason he felt he should wait until the graduation of the Hogwarts students. Snape saw no valid reason for this; the students would have obtained their educations to the fullest; they would have reached their maximum potential. Why wait, until the students were stronger warriors? Why not take them now, unripe, unwary, and unprepared?  
  
"This meeting will never end," murmured Lucius. "I have better things to do at home, and surely you must attend to your pet..."  
  
"Keep talking, and I promise I'll bring your son's name up again as an option," Snape murmured back.  
  
"...kneazle," finished Lucius, wickedly. "Or, better yet, come home with me. We'll have some Jameson's and some chess."  
  
"Tempting, but don't I recall you bidding me never to return to the Manor?"  
  
"I could be persuaded to change my mind. Narcissa misses you."  
  
" _Narcissa_ misses me." Snape allowed himself the smallest upward curve of the corners of his mouth. "But as you say, my...kneazle awaits. Thank you, Lucius, but after this I'm going home."  
  
"Where is home, these days? Surely not your ancestral pile, I know you've not been back there since your mother died. You're waiting for your father to expire, aren't you?"  
  
Snape said nothing. Lucius settled back, folding his arms, satisfied that he had prodded Snape into aggravation.  
  
When the meeting finally ended, Snape Apparated home. He landed, as usual, just outside the cottage gate. He could see light in the kitchen windows, lit by ever-burning candles. _She's still awake_ , he thought. She never left candles burning while they slept; it was too dangerous. All the kitchen windows were open to the night air. Snape could feel the night's stifling, near-thundery closeness, feel the sizzle of the charged ions waiting for release, like pressing his way through a weakened warding. The smell of the impending storm was strong in his sensitive nostrils.  
  
As he pushed open the gate and stepped through, the Augurey shrieked mournfully from its bedraggled rooftop nest, untidier than any stork's would be; and launched its dark-winged body into the night air. In that moment, the rain came pouring down from the pendulous clouds. Snape cursed, running for the cottage door before he got too soaked, thinking of the herb seeds, not yet sprouted, and now likely washing out of their careful plantings. He stepped inside and swept off his cloak and mask, running a quick charm over them to dry them.  
  
"Hermione? Are you still awake?" he called. His first and most anxious glances went to the trouble spots: the sink, with its potential pile of dirty dishes: empty. The back of the door, where the crockery had smashed: cleared. That damnable fireplace: clean, and empty, and cold. The bedroom, then, he thought to himself, smiling. A little spat followed by a rush to sensation and ecstasy. _Ah, my little Gryffindor._ He wandered to the bedroom, shaking the wrinkles from his cloak.  
  
The bedroom was dark, unlike the kitchen. Snape stepped inside and heard a fearful yowling from under the bed, easily heard even over the roaring of the rain on the roof. "Damnable kneazle," he muttered. "Hermione, you must be awake after that noise. Am I forgiven? Or at least permitted to sleep next to you, if I'm not forgiven?"  
  
There was no sound from the bed. _Pouting_ , thought Snape, and murmured to his wand to conjure a soft light, not the bright throbbing glare of _Lumos_ , but a glow, enough to see by.  
  
The bed was strangely dark in places. Hermione lay sprawled, boneless and naked and still, hair over her face. Snape detected a new scent, one he had not smelled for a very long time.  
  
 _That's blood, blood's smell, blood's darkness, there on those sheets...blood...a great deal of blood..._  
  
The cat was still yowling. The noise was both inside his brain and yet far away. It seemed Snape could not orient himself in the room, with that noise coming from everywhere, and the pounding of his own heart's blood in his ears.  
  
" _LUMOS_!" cried Snape, lunging for the bed. The flaring blue glare of his wandlight made the redness of the blood seem black on the whiteness of the sheets. Hermione's wand lay beside her on the bed, splotched with blood, and next to it was a scalpel.  
  
"No, no, no no no," he was stuttering, reaching to touch her neck, pushing aside the tumbled honey hair, frantically seeking a pulse in the deep part of her throat, finding none.  
  
There was blood everywhere on the bed. _Everywhere_. The rational part of him reminded the irrational part of him that a little blood went a long way. His eyes darted wildly over her body. Blood streaked her thighs. Blood painted her small breasts. Blood matted her honey hair. Blood, more blood, pooled and sticky between her outstretched arms, where her limp hands lay next to her wand and her bright blade, dimmed with her life's fluid. _All that's missing is Voldemort_ , thought Snape, _dancing his dead Mudblood dance on our bed. Or my name, carved into the flesh of her arm, or written in blood upon the wall. Hermione loves Severus, till death do they part._  
  
"Fuck, oh, Hermione, no..." His panicked fingers moved again on her neck; still nothing.  
  
 _Prey sparrow, fallen to predator owl at last, evil Gnome King Snape, successful in his hunting...all heads have turned to see what I've done...this Sleeping Beauty will never waken in her thorn-choked tower, not with such death-cold kisses as mine._  
  
His hands moved to her wrists and forearms -- only they could be the source of this rich flood -- and there, beneath his fingers, he felt warmth, and the faintest of pulses, weakening as he touched them, and more blood, oozing past his fingertips as he pressed.  
  
Snape dropped his wand on the bed and began shredding long strips from the sheet. He hurriedly bound her wrists, muttering whatever healing incantations his fevered brain could recall as he did so. Spells for colds, sneezes; spells for broken bones. Spells to heal potion burns. Spells for healing nicks and cuts.  
  
 _Yes, spells for cuts. Say them again, and again, and again._  
  
The spells were interspersed with Snape's gasping cries of her name, entreaties for her to waken, to open her eyes, to speak, to move, _to tell him she would be all right_. In only moments he had snatched her into his arms, dragging the bloody sheet with him, and was running for the fireplace in the kitchen.  
  
There he stepped into the fireplace with her, intending to Floo to St. Mungo's, and realized he had no wand, and that the fireplace had been sealed against Floo traffic. "F-f-fuck," he hissed. " _Accio_ wands!" And moments later, both wands came whizzing from the bedroom. He crouched on the hearth long enough to remove the seals from the fireplace and grab a massive handful of Floo powder -- enough to take every Slytherin in his former House through the system -- and shouted, "St. Mungo's! St. Mungo's!!"  
  


~*~

  
  
At the other end of the Floo, Snape staggered with his precious, bloody burden into a pristine lobby; tiled floors, white walls, a few green plants scattered near chairs. He emerged, still shouting the name of the hospital, and was promptly surrounded by a flock of medi-personnel in white robes.  
  
"She's slit her wrists," he gasped. "Gashed them. A scalpel. I bound them, I think I...I think I stopped the bleeding, tell me she's still alive, tell me..." His face sagged down into her curling, blood-streaked mane of hair. "Tell me she will be all right." For she did not smell like Hermione; gone was that warm smell, that greenness, that hint of the black rose from the Forbidden Forest. She smelled old, and dry, and bloody. Here in the whiteness of St. Mungo's, Hermione was a freakish red fright, instead of dark, as she had been in his distorting wandlight. Snape felt his gorge rising and choked it back. _So red, so much red, so much blood, she is so cold, and so still in my arms. Never was she still in my arms._  
  
White arms were reaching, tenderly, to take her. Snape could not release her. "I will -- she would not like you to touch her, she doesn't -- I will carry her," he stammered. "Though she would like you, dressed in white this way, your white arms, so white --" He cut himself off, realizing he was beginning to babble.  
  
"We'll take care of her, we must see to those arms, perhaps a transfusion..." The murmurs were soothing. "Give her to us, you can come along, if that will help." They were already moving him along; another white blur was bringing a bed on wheels to meet them. "Lay her down here," said they. Snape, stupid in his grief, sat on the bed with her in his arms.  
  
"I cannot...I cannot," he gasped. Someone nearby uttered a spell and the entire group of them vanished, Portkeyed to another room, smaller, brighter, whiter, emptier.  
  
"He's in shock," said they. "Look at his eyes."  
  
"You must let go," someone else was saying. "Let us take her, we need to take her."  
  
"No," said Snape, one last time, before someone's wand tip touched the center of his forehead, and he stopped thinking, feeling, hearing, seeing.  
  


~*~

  
  
What roused Snape not much later was the sensation of someone scrubbing at his hands, and a voice, speaking softly.  
  
"I think it's actually all her blood, and not his. I don't believe he's injured."  
  
Snape was suddenly on his feet with a roar, groping for his wand, eyes wild, casting about himself for Hermione. "Get your hands off me! Where is she? _What have you done with her!"_  
  
"It's all right -- it's all right, she's not far! She's just behind that curtain." The small medi-wizard in front of Snape gestured frantically, overwhelmed by tall Snape and his wildness.  
  
Snape pushed past the wizard and his partner and ripped back the indicated curtain. Hermione lay, still and pale, on the bed with wheels. Three medi-witches and wizards were chanting over her, their wands glowing. A clear flask of some cherry-red fluid hovered near, dripping glowing red drops onto her skin. Each droplet seemed to be quickly absorbed.  
  
"What are you doing to her?" Snape demanded.  
  
"Quiet, please," begged the small wizard who had been scrubbing at Snape's hands. "They're restoring her blood balance. It requires intense concentration."  
  
Snape turned and clutched the wizard by his robe collar in one hand, his wand pointing at the wizard's temple. "She's alive, you're telling me?"  
  
"Yes, yes, of course she is!" Panicked, the little man reached for his own wand. Snape's eyes calmed, and the wizard relaxed a bit. "Here, sir -- why don't you sit down here, we should perhaps talk a bit." His partner summoned a quill and some parchment. "Tell us your name, sir."  
  
Snape grew wary. "Why?"  
  
"For our records, of course."  
  
"No."  
  
"But -- "  
  
"You will heal my companion, then we will depart."  
  
There was a stirring behind the curtain and one of the witches emerged. "She will be going nowhere anytime soon."  
  
Snape was on his feet again. The two in front of him scattered. His eyes narrowed at the witch. "What do you mean? Of course she will. As soon as possible."  
  
The witch folded her arms and stood her ground. "I mean, there's more wrong with this girl than a simple blood balancing will cure." She glared at Snape. "I remember you, you're Professor Snape. From Hogwarts. You made my life hell for seven years. Now, Professor...suppose you tell me what you know about this girl. Who is she, and how did she get into this terrible state?"  
  
 _Think fast, Snape. I don't remember this student._  
  
"She is my niece," he lied. "She's not been well for quite some time. A nervous disorder, I believe."  
  
The witch's eyebrows rose. "You brought your _naked niece_ to St. Mungo's."  
  
Snape drew himself up. "You may as well stop quizzing me. This girl's problems are very personal, and I will not have you agitating her in this manner."  
  
"I'm not agitating her, I'm agitating you, Professor. You need to tell me what's going on with her, or I will be forced to use Legilimency on her." The witch stepped closer, and Snape found himself weakening. He needed desperately to get help for Hermione, but to get help meant giving up at least part of her story, and more importantly, giving up their life together at Angharad's cottage.  
  
"In private," he said now.  
  
"Very well. Follow me, Professor." She took him across the hall to a small room, and closed the door. Snape warded and silenced the room. Her eyebrows rose once again.  
  
"I don't remember you," said Snape.  
  
"I was Amanda Quickstep," she said. "Doctor Morrow, now."  
  
Snape blinked. It seemed his former students were everywhere, but this one he didn't recall at all. "No matter."  
  
"I recall a certain Daily Prophet scandal from a few months back, don't I, Professor?" she said now, her arms crossed once again, but her wand at the ready in her competent hand. "You, and a student -- an affair, and your sacking."  
  
"Really." _A shame I didn't read it when Narcissa offered. It seems to have made a lasting impression on the wizarding world, the liaison between Hogwarts' evil Potions Master and delicate Head Girl._  
  
"Yes, really. And then I recall something about a young woman, an excellent student, vanishing from Hogwarts School not long afterwards." She met Snape's gaze. "Is it the same girl?"  
  
"It is."  
  
"Shame on you, Professor Snape."  
  
"Yes, shame on me," he agreed, hissing, moving in close to menace the medi-witch, who earned even more of his respect by continuing to stand her ground. "But mostly, shame on her parents for neglecting and abusing her. Here, Doctor Morrow, is what you _will do_. You will treat this girl and cure what ails her. She has been experiencing extreme stress for years, manifesting itself in a compulsion to scrape at the skin of her hands and arms until they are raw and bleeding. I will not tell you the details of the problems with her parents -- that is for you to ascertain, if she will allow it. I have made promises to this girl that I will not break. She is sixteen, and therefore you will not contact her parents without her permission. You will not contact Hogwarts without her permission. If she wishes to leave St. Mungo's, you will not restrain her. You will only proceed with such treatment as this girl approves, once she is awake, and in the meantime, only such care as I approve. She is well aware of her situation and will be able to make decisions regarding her own care. Those are her _rights_ , and you will abide by them, or I will take her away from here."  
  
"I don't see how she will be rational enough to make these kinds of decisions, Professor," Amanda Morrow insisted. "This young woman tried to commit suicide. I might not be able to hospitalize her against her will, but having taken a vow to do all that I can for my patients, I must warn you it is for her own good that she stay here where she can be properly treated and cared for."  
  
"You don't know this girl. I do. She has lived under this dark cloud for a very long time and is astonishingly bright." Snape tried to get his anger under control and change the subject. "I do not believe she tried to kill herself. I believe she is trying to get control of her world, in any way she can. How long until she is conscious, do you think?"  
  
"Several hours yet. Controlling her world, by slashing her wrists? That is far too simplistic a view. Perhaps she wasn't trying to kill herself, but perhaps she was. What makes you think you have correctly interpreted her motives? I told you before -- there is much more wrong with this girl than meets the eye. When the desperation of suicide seems the only option, it is no longer simply an attempt to 'control her world.' It is a cry for help, a virtual _scream_ for help."  
  
Snape ignored the healer's comments, though they struck home, sharp and deeply. "Then we will discuss this with her when she awakens. And in the meantime, I will be staying with her."  
  
"I think it best if you do not. How do I know that you are telling the truth?"  
  
"If you wish me to swear on my wand, I will do so."  
  
The witch looked him up and down. "I do not like this at all, Professor. If the Prophet article was anywhere close to the truth, you are a danger to this young woman."  
  
Snape glared, and brought up his wand. "Do not make me demonstrate my seriousness," he said, softly. "If the Prophet article discussed me much at all, then you know I will not scruple to use my powers to get what I want. And what I want, just now, is what's best for that young woman. Which is for me to stay near her, and for you to tell no one she is a patient here."  
  
"I am bound by my professional oath to --"  
  
"And I am bound by _nothing_ , except my love for the girl in the other room," Snape interrupted. "Do you understand me? I have cast Unforgivables before, Doctor. An _Imperio_ is nothing, if it will help that girl."  
  
There was a long, considering silence. She looked at his wand, and at his dark, focused eyes, and the blood all over his hands, his face, his clothing. She blinked slowly, taking a deep breath. "Does she at least have a name?"  
  
"You may call her Jane, if you must. She may tell you her name later, but it will be her choice to do so or not."  
  
"I could get it easily from the articles."  
  
Snape flicked his wand irritably, and was rewarded when the medi-witch finally flinched. "I am certain you could. But I would prefer you to respect your patient's privacy."  
  
There was another long silence. And then, finally, capitulation. "It is against my better judgment," Dr Morrow said. "But for now, I will agree to your conditions. _Until_ she awakens, and then we will have to see about this situation."  
  
"Thank you," said Snape, stiffly.  
  
She looked him up and down again. "Let's get you cleaned up. You're covered in blood. You don't want her seeing that when she wakes up."  
  


~*~

  
  
After another hour of steady attention to Hermione, the medi-personnel decided that she had been stabilized and simply needed sleep. Dr Morrow glared at Snape on her way out the door. "You will call us the instant she wakes," she said.  
  
Snape did not reply. He was already summoning a chair to Hermione's bedside, where he drew it close and took her pale, cool hand in his. The flask of red fluid continued to drip over the skin of her right shoulder, but it was slower to absorb now, which Snape assumed was a good sign. He closed his eyes and brought her hand to his lips. He kissed the back, turned it gently, and kissed the palm. "Hermione, my love," he whispered. "I'm here."  
  
After a while, he placed her hand back on the bed. He crossed his arms on the mattress and propped his chin on his hands, studying her. The color was gradually returning to her lips. Her breathing seemed less labored, more like the breathing of sleep.  
  
A long time later, without realizing it, Snape slept, his legs sprawled beneath Hermione's bed, his forehead pillowed on his folded arms. And as he slept, worn by care and regret, he did not feel Hermione's hand come to rest on his head, nor her fingers curling into his hair.  
  


~*~

  
  
"Snape."  
  
The rasping voice was strange, but someone was calling him. He struggled to waken.  
  
"Snape."  
  
"I'm here, I'm here," he mumbled, lifting his head. His legs ached; his knees had locked, hyper extended for hours. A hand was tangled in his hair, and immediately in front of his face was an arm, bandaged in white gauze.  
  
"Snape."  
  
He got to his feet urgently, grasping Hermione's hand in his and glancing around the room in alarm. They were alone, at least for the moment. "Hermione," he said, pressing one hand to her face. "Right here. I'm with you."  
  
Her head tossed on the pillow. "Summoned..." she moaned.  
  
"Yes, but I'm back. Open your eyes, Hermione."  
  
He watched the thick gold-tipped lashes rise, hesitate, and sink back down. She tossed her head again. Snape noticed that the flask of red liquid had ceased to drip, and was hovering half-full at the head of the bed. _Has her blood been balanced again?_ He kissed her hand and brushed back the hair from her brow. "Open your eyes," he said again.  
  
Hermione drew a deep breath and the lashes flickered up, down, then up again, and her brown eyes searched slowly for him. "Snape."  
  
"Yes."  
  
She swallowed hard. "My throat hurts," she mumbled.  
  
"You're thirsty," he said. "Let me find you some water." He released her and turned away to the table next to the bed, and as he moved away and she reached for him, she saw the heavy bandages on her arms.  
  
Hermione gave a terrible howl of despair. Snape dropped the pitcher and glass, startled, and quickly turned back to be within reach. "It didn't work," she shrieked. Her hands clutched him, one snarling in his hair, the other clawing at his shoulder.  
  
Snape took hold of her shoulders and pressed her back into the pillows, shoving his angry face into hers. "Calm yourself, you foolish girl! Be silent! How _dare_ you try something so stupid!"  
  
Hermione burst into tears and Snape edged his hip onto the bed to pull her into his arms. "Merlin -- Merlin, Hermione. Why did you do it?"  
  
She threw her arms around him and sobbed into his neck. Snape could hear her trying to speak, but could not make out the words. He contented himself with rather harsh pats to her back. He was not good at comforting distraught women, he thought to himself. Finally, he began to speak, himself, in an attempt to quiet her.  
  
"I got home from the summoning, and found you in our bed. You and your fucking blade, and damned near every drop of blood in your body, Hermione." His hand moved into her hair, and he laughed roughly. "I'd been hoping for another fight, and make-up sex. And instead all I find is you, half dead, covered in blood, and your familiar howling under the bed, and that damned Augurey shrieking from the rooftop. Hermione, give me something to help me understand this."  
  
Hermione began to quiet, snuffling wetly into his neck. He thought she might be listening, so he continued. "I bound up your wrists and arms -- Merlin, the blood -- it was everywhere. Then I Floo'ed us here, to St. Mungo's. They've been balancing your blood since midnight."  
  
"Crookshanks --" she mumbled.  
  
"I left him at home -- did you think I cared about a howling animal when your lifeblood was soaking into the mattress?"  
  
"He must be terrified." Her head came up and she looked at him, wet-eyed, nose dripping. Snape mopped at her nose with the sleeve of his robe.  
  
"He will get over it," said Snape harshly. "I, however, will not." He closed his eyes a moment. "I will see that forever in my nightmares, Hermione." He brushed his palms over her cheeks. "Tell me why?"  
  
"I couldn't stand it any longer," she said, simply, and shrugged. "It...it seemed like the only thing to do." Her eyes took on a far-away look. "It was beautiful...thick, and slow, and red, and --" Snape shook her, hard. Her head rocked back.  
  
"How dare you try to kill the only thing I love in this world, you little bitch." His voice broke on the last words.  
  
He clenched his jaw and was horrified to see the world begin to swim at its edges. _Tears. Stop, you will frighten her. Good, let her be frightened._ He put her away from him and rose from the bed, turning his back. "I have not told them your name here at St. Mungo's, but they have already recognized me. They know you are the girl over whom I was sacked. It will not be long before they know who you are, as well -- but I have extracted a promise from your doctor, Dr Morrow, that she will not try to contact your parents, or Hogwarts, without your permission, and she will not try to stop you leaving here if that is what you want."  
  
Behind him, Hermione was sobbing afresh. "I'm sorry, Snape, I'm so sorry, please, please..." He heard her trying to scramble out of bed, and the sound was his undoing. He turned back to her and caught her up into his arms before her feet touched the floor. He sank onto the hard chair with her across his lap and buried his face in her hair.  
  
"I...I cannot do this any longer," he whispered. "Hermione, I cannot fix you. Whatever it is I do for you, however it is that being with me helps you, it's only skin deep."  
  
"Stop," she whispered, anguished. He knew that she understood what was coming.  
  
"You must get well," he said now. "And you must live your own life. I can do neither of these things for you."  
  
"Don't you send me away, you bastard!" she wailed.  
  
"I'm not sending you away," he said. "You are staying here, and I am going back to the cottage. You need what they can give you here, not what poor things I have to offer you, and only temporary things at that."  
  
She tried to take his face between her hands, but Snape knew that if he once looked into those drowning, wet brown eyes, he would be lost: he would give in yet again, and this vicious cycle would start all over. Peace and joy, for a while, followed by anxiety, and then depression, and then she would hurt herself again. All the while shredding the chambers of his heart to bits.  
  
"I love what you offer me," she sobbed now. "You love me."  
  
"Merlin, yes."  
  
"I want to be with _you_ , Snape. _I need to be with you_."  
  
"You need -- you need to get well, Hermione. I've done all I can do, I know nothing else except to hold you, make love to you, protect you, teach you my druid ways, the things that keep me from flying apart. But you need something that I can't give you; I don't even know what it is. But here -- here, they will know, I think." He fought the fierce urge to kiss her soft neck.  
  
"No," she whispered, stiffening in his arms.  
  
"Yes," he replied. Now he was able to look at her, and lifted his head. The hardest things had been said. "You must first get well. And then you must see the world. And you must pass your NEWTs, and you must love other men, try new things --" He broke off when her fingers pressed hard against his lips.  
  
"I don't want other men," she told him now.  
  
"But you will," he said softly. "You must. You're sixteen. I'm forty two. Our time -- our time is not now."  
  
"Then when?" she wailed again. "When can a time be, for such as we are?"  
  
"Get well first," he said. "Then we may talk about 'when,' perhaps."  
  
"Where will you go? What will you do? Where can I find you?"  
  
"First I will go back to the cottage. Your damned cat must be attended to until you can send for him."  
  
Her mouth squared again and her eyes filled with tears. "You'll care for him, won't you? Pet him, feed him?"  
  
"Yes, you stupid girl. I'll tend your damned cat." He wiped roughly at the tears spilling down her cheeks. "When you are well, send for him." He kissed her mouth and felt it soften under his instantly. "Ah...I will miss this. Kissing you. Having you near."  
  
"Then don't send me away," she said again.  
  
"You know I must. Admit it."  
  
She was mutinously silent until he shook her. "I will not tell you what you think you want to hear, Snape. Not when it isn't true, not for me. I love you, and that will not change."  
  
"You're sixteen, Hermione. You have changed every single day we've been together." Snape sighed. "I must also go to Hogwarts. I...need to make Minerva understand what I have done, and talk to her about you, if you'll permit that. And I must talk to Potter. And... _Weasley_...and Malfoy, I think. Will you let me do that?"  
  
"If -- if you think you must, I won't stop you."  
  
"I must," he told her. He looked into her eyes for a long time and saw there only sadness, and love. "Now...let me call your doctors. They wanted to know when you woke up. Then, after a while, I will go home, and pack some things for you."  
  
"I want you to send me my druid things," she said. "Including the sickle."  
  
He shook his head. "Hermione..."  
  
"Damn it, Snape, I've had that sickle for months, I could have cut myself with it at any time, but I didn't, don't you see? And if I return to Hogwarts, I must have it for the Circle." She stroked his face. "You keep Angharad's book for me, until I return." She pressed a kiss to his lips, then looked at him sternly. "Promise. I'll be back when I'm well. Promise me you'll keep my book for me, my mentor."  
  
"I promise, my apprentice."


	29. Illumination

"these precious illusions in my head  
did not let me down when I was defenseless  
and parting with them is like  
parting with invisible best friends"  
  
\-- Precious Illusions. Alanis Morissette  
  
  
"Well well, look what we have here…" A pair of big, summer-blue eyes was scrutinizing Hermione with what seemed like insatiable curiosity. "So what would be your problem," a thoughtful, husky voice wondered. "You slit your wrists… probably makes you depressive… A simple case of negative energy projection. How completely bor-"  
  
"Chloe Nott!" The voice Hermione had learned to recognize as Amanda Morrow's interrupted the girl's flow of words, making her roll her eyes and leisurely pull herself from the side of Hermione's bed.  
  
"Off with you now," Morrow urged her with a voice that was surprisingly soft. "Leave Hermione alone and go mind your own business. I won't have you disturbing her much needed rest."  
  
Hermione, blinking, opened her eyes to protest. "It's all right, Doctor-"  
  
Amanda Morrow hurried to her bedside at once, where Chloe Nott still stood. "You must regain your strength," she said, leaning to check Hermione's pulse, "and the best way to do so is by sleep. Normal sleep, I should say, and not one caused by sleeping potions. And as to you, Chloe," Amanda turned to glare at the lean, blue-eyed girl, "I'd expect you to know and respect this place's rules by now."  
  
This statement, Hermione noted, caused Chloe to lose her calm, bold façade. A muscle in her temple twitched, and she threw back her head, swinging her glittering mass of soft, baby-fine curls. "You mean, after seven years of hospitalization I should probably be able to recite them," she retorted with an illusory sweet smile. "Perhaps be given some kind of position, a salary maybe, seeing I've been here longer than you have…" Chloe pouted her lips. "You know what, Amanda, fuck the rules."  
  
Dr. Morrow sighed. "I'm sorry you feel this way."  
  
Chloe, who was on her way out of the small, pleasant room, turned her head to look at the healer one more time. "Bollocks."  
  
Fully awakened by now, Hermione wriggled into a partial recumbence, uncomfortable to be lying where the other woman had been standing. She was now leaning against the head board, observing the healer, who, noting the stress in her eyes, sighed, and pulling a chair from the small writing stand, sat herself at the girl's bedside. "That was Chloe," she said. "Chloe's one of our oldest patients and she will be your roommate-"  
  
At this prospect, Hermione's eyes darted toward the second, four poster bed which was located at the other side of the room. The bedcovers were disheveled, with several books carelessly tossed amongst them. And while the disorder deterred her, she was surprised and then delighted to recognize some of the titles: Kant's "Critique of Pure Reason", "Most Potente Potions", "Watership Down"…  
  
Healer Morrow, following Hermione's gaze, smiled gently. "Chloe is a very clever girl. Much like yourself."  
  
She frowned. "Why did I never meet her in Hogwarts, then? She seems about my age."  
  
Amanda's face bore a severe expression. "I am not allowed to share the details of the other patients' conditions with you, but I am allowed to say, however, that certain states of spiritual drift deny one the capability of living outside a certain power shield that we sustain here in St. Mungo's. Once outside the wards, those maladies would consume the afflicted person."  
  
Again, Hermione's eyes traveled to the second bed, scanning the books scattered on the linens: their lush, quadrangular forms had been emphasized by the thin pencil work of light and shadow. She found herself wondering about the other girl, locked inside St. Mungo's just like Adams' and Kant's words were locked and preserved inside those innocent looking books, and how wild and fierce was her spirit, despite the confinements. And so refined were these: even the window at the rear end of the room, was charmed to show bright blue sky instead of the boisterous city outside. _How strong this girl must be, or how forlorn. Looking at this blank faced window I feel suffocated myself…_  
  
In the time since her arrival at the St. Mungo's almost four days ago, Hermione had been transferred from the first floor Emergency Room, to the youths' closed ward on the fourth floor, in the renovated section dedicated to the treatment of spiritual drift: a branch of medicine known in the Muggle world as psychiatry. Small wonder, she thought cynically, that she'd had no idea in what direction to research when seeking for a wizarding cure for her so-called problem.  
  
Her first memory of the place was Snape at her side, her fingers prying in his disheveled hair. His eyes were wild behind the thin icing of lethal exhaustion. Only then did she realize what she had done and an overwhelming wave of shame flooded her. And along with the shame, the poisonous realization that even attempting suicide, she had failed. Hardly- hardly the worst. _When God closes a door, he shuts the window too, and when you're already down, he kicks you in the ribs, to make sure your pain is definite._  
  
…"How dare you try to kill the only thing I love in this world, you little bitch."…  
  
 _I am going to hear those words in my dreams, she mused later; knowing his voice would break attempting to utter the last syllable and his eyes would glaze with tears. And perhaps, in my dreams, we'll be together again, so I'll have to wake up only to realize he pushed me away because I've been so utterly, utterly stupid…_  
  
But she would not think of it- must not think of it. Not if she wanted to keep intact the small part of her soul that was still capable of absorbing heat and enjoying food and appreciating Dr. Amanda Morrow's wit.  
  
The Doctor - one of the five healers and five trainees serving in the youths ward - was the person who welcomed Hermione back into the living world.  
  
She had been hanging in the fairies' realm for three days of metaphorical darkness, refusing to allow food into her stomach, crying into her pillow and ignoring the medical staff hovering around her. At last, after a typological number of mourning days, a breakfast tray had been placed on the collapsible arm attached to her bed and a no-nonsense voice ordered her to eat. Recognizing authority, she found herself crawling to a sitting position, rubbing her eyes, and reaching for the cutlery. In front of her sat a soulful looking woman in her mid-thirties who watched her with blue, warm eyes.  
  
"Hello, child," she greeted Hermione. "I'm glad you decided to join us. I'm Healer Amanda Morrow, though I hope you'd choose to call me Amanda. I'm working here in St. Mungo's and my main specialization is Illumination. This means that although I can do some basic mediwizarding, my first tool is Legilimency." The healer smiled gently.  
  
It was not the kind of smile to bare one's teeth, she noticed: Amanda Morrow's lips barely moved when she smiled. But her eyes; her warm, blue, somewhat melancholy eyes were washed with the smile, filled with sunlight like another person's eyes would be brimmed with tears.  
  
Then she spoke again. "The Professor - he was my own Potions teacher when I was at Hogwarts," Amanda said, "identified you as Jane. I don't know what you have been through," she continued as she watched Hermione eating. "I don't know why it is you deem it necessary to conceal your true identity, or why you chose a charm so strong as the Fidelius Charm- no, I didn't look into your brain to find it," the healer assured her as she saw the alarmed expression on the young woman's face. "Legilimency is never undertaken without the patient's permission. But I am an experienced healer and I was trained to sense those kinds of distractions, especially the kinds of charms enabling me reach and help my patients." She peered at Hermione appreciatively. "Do you know how the Fidelius Charm works?"  
  
"It prevents one from tracking the magical signature of the charmed substance - a person, a location or an item," she answered without thinking. "It has other qualities as well- combining a complex version of the obscuring charm, the Fidelius would make sure other physical signs such as smell, fingertips, DNA et cetera would go unnoticed, but the temporary erasing of the magical signature is the most important."  
  
Dr. Morrow nodded. "And because I can't detect your magic, I am unable to reach it," she explained. "And without reaching your magic, I can't help you. Can you see why it is important that you break the charm?"  
  
Hermione narrowed her eyes, watching the healer mistrustfully. "Why should I trust you to help me?"  
  
"You shouldn't," was Amanda Morrow's simple and to-the-point answer. "I would first explain to you what kind of therapy we offer you here in St. Mungo's, and you, being the clever girl you are, would make your own decision whether you accept it or not."  
  
"You mean-," she eyed the elder woman suspiciously, "you mean you won't force me to stay?"  
  
"You're over sixteen," came the reply. "Even if I wanted, I couldn't hospitalize you against your will. However, seeing the state in which you arrived, I strongly recommend that you stay here."  
  
Hermione, absentmindedly bringing a spoonful of milk and cornflakes to her mouth, processed the information.  
  
Her gaze drifted towards the window to the side. Snowy clouds were leisurely swirling upon the blank azure which kept staring at her. One could have easily been led to think that there was no sooty, hyperventilating London behind this window. As if the city, and not the expressionless sky, was the illusion. Reminding herself that things were, in fact, the other way around, Hermione listened to the healer's explanation, quickly becoming engaged in a discussion concerning a branch of magic she had never heard of before.  
  
Just like in the Muggle world, the maladies that Illumination was designed to cure were still considered socially taboo. The practice of treating shadowed souls had been swept under the social, if not professional, rug for many years. It was only in the past seventy five years or so that Illumination was given proper recognition and a ward dedicated to the study and cure in St. Mungo's.  
  
Curious, Hermione asked whether Illumination had anything to do with Muggle psychology and psychoanalysis, and was rewarded with a quizzical, appreciative glance from Amanda.  
  
"Indeed," answered the healer, choosing to ignore Hermione's profound knowledge concerning the Muggle world. "Some here, in St. Mungo's, actually call us the Muggle division, seeing how closely Illumination relates to the two important Muggle practices of psychiatry and psychology. However, what Muggles treat with Muggle tools, we view through wizarding eyes, and treat with what I see as both wizarding and humane tools."  
  
The cereal bowl was put aside in favour of a fruit salad she had been forking through without much thought. "Can you go into more details?"  
  
"Of course. Now, I suppose that the simplest explanation, a very brief one, really, would be that what Muggles perceive as a chemical imbalance in the brain, wizards view as some sort of energetic interference, be it a curse or a spell, or simply negative energy projected onto the person, to cause them depression- prevent them from normal functioning, bringing them suicidal thoughts, and the like. But energetic interference is not necessarily the cause of all energetic ailments: we believe that a healthy person is one whose energies are balanced. Much like Muggle medicine, we believe in balance. Only it's not chemicals and neurons we're dealing with, but the way they translate into… wizarding terms."  
  
Hermione narrowed her eyes. "How did you guess I am a Muggle born?"  
  
Dr. Morrow only gave her an entertained, cordial look; smug, but in a rather heartening way. "You gave yourself away with your words, child. Though I am an Illuminator, and we deal with the human soul. We have our tricks."  
  
Hermione nodded slowly. "Very well. I'd like to know what kind of energies does Illumination deals with. Seeing you know so much about Muggle world, you might also know that idle talk about energy is the business of charlatans."  
  
The doctor didn't seem offended. "Yes. I might know what you're talking about. And to your question, the energies that Illumination deals with are the different energies working inside and outside the individual and are known to affect the psyche. Magic is merely tampering with the free energies that already exist in the universe - each branch of magic dealing with a different force: altering, shifting, creating, nourishing and so on. If you are interested, I can loan you some books on the subject- the current scientific research mostly deals with mapping each of the known energies with Muggle methods and instruments-" Amanda gave her another glowing smile, this time baring the edge of a white, crooked set of upper teeth. "Small wonder everybody believes us to be mad ourselves. Anyway, once we have located the source of the energetic imbalance in the individual - that is where Legilimency comes into the picture, we use our magic in order to help restore that balance. And yet, the energetic balance within a person is not easily disturbed," said the healer, sighing. "Often enough, it takes a traumatic experience to shake one out of balance- otherwise it might involve a curse, a negative energy projected on the individual by another person and so forth. Some people are even known to curse themselves, after being put under dramatic stress. One must talk things out in order for the occurrence not to repeat. Therapy by talking is the one method we adopted completely from the Muggle equivalent. That is why I am also qualified as a psychotherapist."  
  
Hermione blinked. "You attended a Muggle university?"  
  
"An Ivy League school, in America," Dr. Morrow noted with some amusement. "Does it qualify me to poke about in your brain?"  
  
Hermione cocked an eyebrow, pained all of a sudden to realize it was a gesture she adopted from Snape. "It certainly helps," she mumbled once the first wave of violent anguish had subsided. Her voice was deprived of the cynicism with which she meant to tint it.  
  
The healer only watched her seriously. "The therapy we offer you here will consist of Legilimency, followed by talking sessions, two times a week. Moreover, we hold biweekly creative magic group therapy we'd be happy for you to attend, though it is the patient's choice whether to take part in it. You would be staying in St. Mungo's youths close ward in an ambulatory, enveloping framework settled to provide you with mental and if needed, physical support at every hour of the day or night, with teenagers about your age, experiencing similar conditions. You would be confined to the ward; that is true- it is not an easy place. We are not dealing with easy people. However, we try to make sure your schedule is full, and that if possible, you'd be able to cope with the time and duties you missed in the outside world. Since most of our patients are of age to attend Hogwarts, we have a small school attached to the ward where some of the basic classes are taught by qualified teachers- some of the classes are held jointly and therefore; geared towards the average student. However, time is spared for individual study with the teacher, time which you'd be able to utilize for your own studies."  
  
Amanda halted, her almond shaped eyes bright with some womanly wisdom: an ancient storyteller sitting in front of a whispering fire, in a dark, moonless night; a witch offering ciphered answers and forbidden cures. The healer's face made Hermione think of an open, arid sky, sizzling with electricity, where every sound would be carried for miles, above dusky, alert land. Dr Morrow's lips, long and narrow - concealing a promise of comfort and solace - captured her attention.  
  
Unaware of her actions, she put the fork aside, brow furrowed with concentration. "I see."  
  
The healer nodded. "This is the treatment we have to offer," she said. "In exchange, you'd have to trust me with your name, and later, with your circumstances, since I would be the Legilimens treating you. I'll give you some time to think it over."  
  
Hermione swallowed. "Thank you."  
  
"You're welcome, child."  
  
And for a brief second, after Amanda Morrow rose to her feet, her small, square hand was on Hermione's hair: not ruffling, not stroking; but merely resting on her head, as if she wished to bless her. Hermione was about to flinch when the healer retreated, and giving her another placid smile, strode from her bedside; back, Hermione supposed to the fourth floor where she belonged.  
  
She rolled in her bed for a while, then began writing a letter to Harry.  
  
Amanda Morrow returned with Hermione's lunch. The healer was not surprised, but neither did she look knowingly at the young woman who sat attentively on the bed with her unruly hair plaited - almost as if she had been waiting for the healer to return.  
  
Looking at the healer's eyes, she was angry to find there patience and understanding: Natalie, too, had those lying eyes, but her lips were pouted and stupid, like a teenaged girl's cherry mouth. Hence, she looked at Dr. Morrow's lips, and found only their long, narrow line; edges turned downward with impression of an infinite sorrow. And yet, in these scanty, severe lips was tenderness. By all means, they were shaped to seem bitter, but nonetheless; they weren't.  
  
Hermione swallowed. "The Fidelius Charm- I put it into use once I realized certain people…" she breathed deeply. "I'd rather not beat around the bush. I received a letter from my parents, in which they told me they were about to take me out of school: I had, and have no intention of returning home. So as not to be found, a friend and I had activated the Fidelius Charm, and I ran away. If I am to remove the charm, any time in the future, will you promise me I won't be returned to my parents' custody?"  
  
"Is there a reason you should not be returned to their custody?"  
  
She glared at the healer, who scrutinized her with a wise, somewhat distant gaze.  
  
"Yes, there is," Hermione said at last. "The reason is because I said so."  
  
"Making subtle ultimatums is not a good basis for a patient-therapist relationship," Amanda noted.  
  
She shook her head. "I'm sorry, but I have no choice. You'll have to promise me not to contact my parents, if you wish me to remove the Fidelius Charm."  
  
"Do you realise… Jane, it is in _your_ best interest to receive proper treatment?" But the healer sighed. "I already gave my promise to Professor Snape. Neither your parents, nor Hogwarts School will be contacted during your hospitalization unless you wish them to be. I might ask you to reconsider it sometime in the future, though. Would you please tell me your name, now?"  
  
Hermione took a steadying breath, tears glazing her eyes at the mention of his name. The last thing he did for her… making sure she was protected, saving her this fight, when she was already lying injured on the floor, with this lovely woman towering above her, counting the seconds before her system failed and she burst into tears. She moistened her lips. "I am Hermione Granger- Since I may be staying here for a while, I would appreciate it very much if you'll send for my things from Hogwarts…" she frowned. "It also appears I should remove the Fidelius- proper removal demands the presence of both the Secret Keeper and the subject… would I be allowed to receive visitors, then?"  
  
Amanda considered this for a while. "Technically, you are supposed to be isolated to the ward for the first week, after which you're allowed to receive visitors in the ward, after they have been sworn to secrecy. It would, indeed, be problematic for us to proceed with the evaluation process without the charm removed, but in your weakened condition, I don't see us getting much work done in this period of time any way. Therefore, I think I'd rather stick to the procedure and wait for the charm's removal. Once this week is over, you may invite your friend and remove the Fidelius."  
  
It had been several hours now since she arrived on the ward: too frail to walk so she had to sit on her ER bed, while Amanda had levitated it. The bedrooms and the living room were quiet at this time of the day, with the teenagers all eating their lunch in the dining room, too busy levitating food at each other and making noisy conversation to notice the newcomer. Amanda showed her to her new room, which she would be sharing with the girl named Chloe Nott, and after helping her to the four poster bed, left Hermione to herself.  
  
She had fallen asleep not long after; cool, breathing air kissing her face, preventing her from being swept back into the fairies realms. Thus, in her calmed, undisturbed sleep, she was unaware of the curious faces hovering above her. Nor did she hear the hushed, preaching voices shooing them out of the room. …All the garden gnomes peeking from their dens, glancing at the invader…  
  
And now, with Dr. Morrow at her side, she watched as Chloe Nott stalked out of what appeared to be their joint room. The strange, scary face of a hollow-eyed boy stared at her from the door and as quickly disappeared. She finally began to realize where she had landed.  
  
Amanda, following her gaze, looked at the boy. "This is Jervy. Come here, Jervy," she called, summoning the boy with a wide, welcoming gesture of her arm. "Say hello to the new girl."  
  
"N…new g-girl?" Hermione heard a weak, nasal voice, coming from just outside the door. Like the pale, murky eyes of the scrawny thing which was the boy, she loathed the voice at once, yet could not explain her automatic revulsion. Dr. Morrow, who sensed her repulsion, seemed determined to ignore it.  
  
"A new girl," the healer repeated. "And she'd really like to meet you. Now come here, darling."  
  
"All-allright," mumbled Jervy. And then again, a heavy looking head appeared at the doorway; a pair of huge, hollow eyes staring at Hermione behind a lattice made of bent, twisted fingers. In disgust, she noted a trickle of spit clinging to the edge of Jervy's mouth.  
  
"Hi!" called a loud voice that instantly made Hermione shrink - a kick in the guts, inflicting pain which was empirical, something to make her bite her lower lip: substantially different than the shudder caused by Jervey's hollow gaze. "The Flobberworm is making new friends!"  
  
"Stuff it, Lindsey," this voice, however, she recognized- it belonged to the girl, Chloe. The one who was doomed never to leave St. Mungo's: her roommate, who read Kant and Adams and Reilly… "Jerv is my friend," Chloe continued. "And if you won't learn to keep your mouth shut when it comes to him, I'll make it my business to see that your stay here will be as miserable as possible, so be careful-"  
  
"Hi, hi," the other, feminine voice lowered in a protective manner. "No need to get so stressed. Didn't know he's with you, that's all."  
  
"And if not for me?" Hermione could hear Chloe answer, her gaze trailing to meet Amanda's glowing eyes. "What would you do then?" Chloe went on. "Bully him because he's weak? Because he can't protect himself? Does it make you feel stronger, Lindsey? Does it make you feel better about yourself?"  
  
"Oh, just shut up!" the other girl erupted, "you disabled freak! Go and hang around with your demented little pet!"  
  
At that, the two women in the hospital bedroom, one young and one older, could hear the sharp, ringing sound of a palm meeting a soft cheek, followed by loud, assertive footsteps. A moment later, Chloe Nott once again appeared in the doorway, and winding her arms around Jervy's neck, gave a daring look at Hermione. "Hello, new girl. I'm Chloe, this is Jerv. We're friends; he hangs around here quite a lot. If you mind him, I suggest you get yourself another room."  
  
"Chloe-" Amanda began.  
  
The tall girl, swinging her hair behind her shoulders, tightened her lips. "Jervy's my friend. I won't have a roommate who won't have Jerv."  
  
"F-friends," echoed the smaller boy, raising his hand to touch Chloe's arm. A crooked, peculiar smile touched the corners of his mouth, and for a moment, he almost seemed real, with a trace of expression tinting his weird, elfin face. Then the smile was gone and all that was left was the spittle trickling down his chin; a juicy droplet landing on Chloe's sleeve. Worrying her lower lip with a feeling she could not identify, Hermione watched the other girl pulling a handkerchief out of her robe pocket and turning the boy to look at her.  
  
Her brow furrowing with concentration, Chloe twisted the fine cambric around her index finger, and lifting her hand, gently wiped Jervy's mouth clean, making sure there was no more drool trickling from the soft, slack lips.  
  
"Well," Chloe stressed, their eyes meeting across the room as the curly headed girl folded the cambric kerchief and put it back in her pocket. "Jerv's a fine companion, right, Jervy?"  
  
"S-sure," repeated the boy, nodding toward Hermione with his hollow eyes. "Jervy's friends w-w-with…" a muscle near his left eye twitched several times. "F-friends with Chloe… I love Chloe very much."  
  
"And Chloe loves you back," the tall girl reassured him. "So will the new girl, right?"  
  
Hermione was afraid of Chloe's desperate determination. Afraid of Jervy's disability, Jervy's drool, and above all, of his hollow eyes - when she tried looking into the two black holes, set where normal human eyes where supposed to be looking back at her, she could see her worst nightmares coming true: disabled, dependent, stupefied. And even so, in the two of them curled together- two permanently invalid people; two of God's step-children, there was a certain beauty, a certain holiness. They were both shining, in spite and because of their horrible, irreparable damage. And as Jervy's eyes were hollow, Chloe's eyes were deep, animated and resonant. And with these eyes clinging to hers, Hermione found herself nodding.


	30. Persuading Minerva

_that you should ever think,may god forbid  
and(in his mercy) your true lover spare:  
for that way knowledge lies,the foetal grave  
called progress,and negation's dead undoom.  
  
I'd rather learn from one bird how to sing  
than teach ten thousand stars how not to dance  
  
\-- from" you shall above all things be glad and young"  
  
\-- e.e.cummings_  
  
  
  
  
A few days after seeing Hermione settled into St. Mungo's, Snape went to Diagon Alley to see about leasing an owl for a period of time. Eeylops Emporium was agreeable, and Snape returned to Angharad's cottage with a non-descript little screech owl. He did not expect his missives to be heavy.  
  
His first letter went to Minerva, and asked her to meet him at the Hog's Head Inn in Hogsmeade, Friday evening after her last class.  
  
 _Wednesday evening, April, Oxfordshire  
  
Dear Minerva,  
  
I will not blame you if you decide to burn this letter, or return it unopened. But I implore of you the indulgence of your time, and your endless patience with me, this one last time.  
  
I have done grievous harm. I have hurt you. I have hurt Hermione Granger, as well. For these hurts I deserve nothing from you; yet I would presume upon your goodness and whatever remnant of our long acquaintance might still linger in your Gryffindor heart, and ask you to meet me at the Hog's Head Inn Friday evening. We have much to discuss, I believe, and I think you will want to hear what news I have.  
  
I will await you in a private room upstairs Friday evening after classes. The innkeeper will know where to find me.  
  
Yours in abject apology,  
Severus Snape, Vile Slytherin Bastard_  
  
He bundled the bit of parchment carefully, and tied it to the leg of the small screech owl, which stood patiently on a makeshift perch of fruit tree prunings from Angharad's garden. "Take this to Minerva McGonagall, Transfiguration Professor at Hogwarts School. Wait for a reply should one be forthcoming."  
  
It wasn't long, actually -- though it seemed hours, while Snape leafed uselessly through a Potions text he could have recited by heart -- before the owl returned. Snape fished a tidbit for it out of the cupboard, and retrieved his bundle from its leg.  
  
Thankfully the knots holding the parchment were different; Minerva had at least opened his letter. His fingers shook as he unfolded it. On the back side was her familiar scribble, untidy, half-printed, half scripted, smudged from her blunt quill, which for some reason she never sharpened -- it was something he had always done for her, evenings when he visited her office for no particular reason. He could never just sit idly, but even though they had not always chatted on those occasions -- she was often marking essays -- the visits satisfied some dim need that he had for companionship. Going over her quills seemed polite and useful.  
  
 _Dear Vile Slytherin Bastard,  
  
How right you are, you deserve nothing from me, except my contempt.  
  
Yet I find that Miss Granger still deserves my consideration. I will attend.  
  
Minerva McGonagall_  
  
Friday couldn't come fast enough, but finally he was ensconced in a small, snug sitting room on the rickety third floor of the Hog's Head. He waited, his back to the lit fireplace, for Minerva, while the sky outside gradually darkened. When he heard her footsteps in the hall outside, he rose from his seat and went to open the door for her.  
  
She strode in, dressed as usual in her bagging tweed skirt and pointed hat. Her hair was creeping in tendrils from her bun at the end of what looked like a long day. She was pulling off her gloves as she entered.  
  
"Make it brief, Snape," she said. She strode to the fireplace and stood warming herself.  
  
"Is it still cold out?" _Snape, and not Severus._  
  
"It's an April night in Hogsmeade, Snape, what do you think? Please don't try making casual chat, it's not your forte." She turned to glare at him.  
  
Snape sat down, a bit hard. "I have Hermione's permission to speak with you, but before I do, I must exact a promise from you on her behalf."  
  
Minerva looked away scornfully. "You mean you want to tell me the sordid details of your seduction of my Head Girl, and expect to get away clean."  
  
"I mean I expect you to respect her privacy, and not contact her parents, and not let Dumbledore know where she is. Minerva, she used the Fidelius charm before she came to me. She was serious about not being found. I wish to honor that need of hers. If you can't agree, then our conversation will end here and I'll leave and not come back. Yet -- I think she'd like you to know these things. She respects you tremendously. I...I don't expect you to forgive _me_."  
  
She was standing there, watching him with something akin to respect, grudgingly it was true, but watching him nonetheless. He waited. After a time, she nodded. "I recall our visit to the Grangers, I...saw how you were, together, the night I found you -- and I watched her the week after you'd been sacked. Her life was hellish. All right. You have my promise, for now."  
  
"Right then, let me get to the point. I've taken Hermione to St. Mungo's for treatment. She's seeing healers there. From time to time she owls me her progress. She's been there almost three weeks."  
  
"And what brought this on? It's not like you to give up your...toys...so easily." Minerva's voice was bitter.  
  
"I was summoned. It's happened frequently this winter and spring; nearly every week or ten days. Voldemort is becoming restless, and I should talk to you about him as well, but Hermione comes first. You should know, the last time I was away from...from home, away from _her_ , Hermione slit her wrists."  
  
Minerva's right hand went trembling to her lips. Snape watched her blinking quickly, and waved a chair into reach. She collapsed upon it, staring. " _What_?"  
  
"You heard me. She tried to kill herself."  
  
"What have you done to the girl, besides bed her?" Minerva asked now. She fumbled in her pocket for her hanky, and with the tiniest leap of his heart Snape saw it was still his Christmas gift that she carried.  
  
 _So much to say, yet it will matter so little in her opinion of me._ Snape sighed. "There is a thing I have never told you, about myself, Minerva."  
  
"Then don't start now," she said acidly. "I'm here to talk about Hermione. Why did she try to commit suicide?"  
  
"This is also about Hermione." He folded his hands to ensure they kept quiet. "You're aware that I used to be a Death Eater."  
  
"You still are."  
  
He shook his head. "I spy for Dumbledore -- for these children, now. I no longer take solace in what it means to be a Death Eater."  
  
" _Children_ ," she spat. "You admit she's a child. Snape, how _could_ you? How could you...defile her in that way?"  
  
That stung, simply because it was what he asked himself, every single day. He met her gaze and let her see his hurt. "It began innocently enough. You must remember back to early autumn, a week where I did not join you for meals in the Great Hall."  
  
"Yes. But --"  
  
"Will you let me tell this in my own way, or do you simply wish to play Grand Inquisitor before you burn me at the stake?"  
  
"Why you think you deserve consideration of any kind is beyond me, but go ahead -- tell it your way, you Slytherin. I'm sure your words will wriggle and tangle me in them, but I must hear about Hermione."  
  
Snape glared. "I'm trying to get to that, Minerva. As I was saying. There was a period of time between leaving the Death Eaters and coming to work at Hogwarts. You've never asked me what I did in that time. Well, I learned the ways of the Druid, from a witch in Oxfordshire. She is the one who arranged for me to have the Potions job with Dumbledore. She is the one who arranged for my...atonement...by telling Dumbledore about my history. And so I began to spy on Voldemort, once he returned."  
  
"All of this has _nothing to do with Hermione_ , Snape."  
  
" _Will you shut up?_ " The harshness of his tone shocked her, he saw. He had never spoken to her in such a way. While she was stricken silent, he continued. "I have been, in the past few years, reacquainting myself with my Druid training, and using the stone Circle at the edge of the Forbidden Forest for my rituals. Hermione discovered me there, and asked me to teach her. I believe she saw the training as a way to get control over her...issues, those that caused her to scrape herself raw."  
  
"You taught Hermione to be a Druid?"  
  
"I did. She's a skilled one, too. She came into it with a full understanding and acceptance of what the rituals entail, Minerva." Snape caught and held her gaze with his. He would not back down from this point; he was not ashamed of performing the sexual rituals with Hermione, not as long as they were part and parcel of his religion. It was the _other_ involvement that disturbed him, the fact that the relationship did not remain that of apprentice and mentor. "It was glorious, I must tell you that first. For the first time in many years, the ritual succeeded, with her participation, and I -- _we_ \-- were able to awaken the Circle." He held up a hand as she started to speak. He knew that she understood the ancient fertility rites. "Yes, we performed a complete rite, and I mated with her there, at Samhain. With her full and complete knowledge and acceptance and participation."  
  
"Oh, Hermione." Minerva was still stricken. Snape got out of his chair and went to his knees in front of her.  
  
"I firmly believe the training helped her, Minerva. She was so much better afterwards, except for the occasional slide. You saw it yourself. It...well, had we left it at the Druid training, perhaps we would both still be at Hogwarts. But instead it went further."  
  
Minerva's hands came up and went over her eyes. Snape leaned forward and touched her knees. She struck his hands away. "I can't bear to hear any more, Sev -- S -- Snape. She's only a baby."  
  
"She's Hermione, with all of her scars and her past history and her intelligence. No baby, no child."  
  
Now her hands flew to her ears. "You serpent! Talking so reasonably about this!"  
  
"I believe your term was 'vile Slytherin bastard.' I'm only speaking truth, Minerva. When you caught us that night, it -- it was a turning point. I was sacked, and she was disgraced. She discovered where I had gone, and came to find me, to be with me. She left this place behind, much as she loved it, and her two friends, and...you. To be with...me." He swallowed hard. "It was idyllic at first, but eventually her demons found her, and while I was gone to the summonings she...she would hurt herself again. Not always, but often. I had to go, I had to hear what Voldemort has planned for these children -- for _us_. And this last time, before I took her to St. Mungo's, was the worst. She almost died."  
  
Minerva broke down completely now, and allowed his hands to creep back to her knees. "It would have happened, even had she not been with you," she gasped, sobbing. "I could see that. I watched her in that week; she was devastated. She began to hurt herself immediately."  
  
"What sent her to my arms again, Minerva, was not the disgrace among her peers. It was a letter from her parents, calling her home for good. She couldn't go back there, and so she ran. And used the Fidelius charm. I hid her, with me, and we lived together for those weeks. Until now." He reached up and took her hands. She, startled, allowed him to do it -- he had so rarely touched her. "But I have put her away from me now, for her own good. It was all I could do. It's over, though I still -- I still --" he couldn't finish, but she understood. Her blue eyes were swimming. Finally he spoke. "I would do it again, Minerva. All of it."  
  
"Are you quite through?" She tugged one hand free and blotted her weeping eyes and dabbed at her nose.  
  
"Er -- yes." He was taken aback by her matter-of-fact tone. He scowled.  
  
"It's time you told me this whole story, Snape."  
  
He sat back on his heels, letting go of her completely. "I just did."  
  
"No. I mean _Hermione's_ story. I'll ask the questions now, and you will answer them."  
  
"Not without a renewed assurance that you won't tell Hogwarts or her parents where she is. That's for Hermione to do, not you or me." He rose and paced the room, disturbed. What sort of questions would Minerva ask now?  
  
"Do you think I'd endanger one of my House willingly, you idiot? Now, go back to the beginning, with Hermione's parents. Why did we go to the Grangers' house before Christmas? I know now you must have lied to me about why Hermione stayed at Hogwarts for the holidays."  
  
Snape leaned his arms on the mantelpiece and hung his head between them. "You remember the letter we wrote them, about Hermione's hands. Well, it seems that exact problem had happened before, when she was eight. There was therapy then, that seemed to resolve it."  
  
"Go on."  
  
"Minerva, that next morning Hermione's parents owled her about our letter. She came to my office after classes that day and -- she had what amounted, in the Muggle world, to a nervous breakdown. In our world we call that a failure of her magical integrity. That day changed everything, for me at least, and I think for her as well. That day she grabbed a scalpel from my desk drawer and tried to cut herself. Right in front of me."  
  
Minerva gasped and rose. He turned to face her, and was not in time to prevent her sharp slap across his face. "You...she...and you _never told me_? My Head Girl, a member of my house, had a failure of her magic, _Hermione Granger's magic failed her and you never told me?_ You are beyond vile, you are --" she drew back her hand again for another slap, and this time his hand caught her wrist and forced her hand down. _Thank Merlin she did not reach for her wand, Snape._  
  
"You will not speak to me this way, Minerva. You must understand, the secrets she gave me that day...entrusted only to me, I could not share. Until now. You'd better sit down again."  
  
"I will not. Unhand me, you monster."  
  
"No. Here's the truth, Minerva. Hermione's father touches her inappropriately when she is at home -- he's done it for years -- and her mother knew, and never stopped him." He stepped menacingly close to his friend and glowered down at her. "Now then. How was I to violate such a confidence as that, given under such circumstances?"  
  
"And the scraping," Minerva breathed now, "all the damage to her skin...revolved around that trauma?"  
  
"It focuses on touching, on...cleanliness. She felt -- feels -- certain things are unclean, including herself, and so she must scrape away the filth. New skin is clean. _Blood_ is clean. Minerva, she has no idea what a loving touch is all about." _Nor did I, until Hermione_ , he thought to himself. _Had Minerva struck me before I loved Hermione, I would have killed her without thinking. Without remorse, probably. Even with Angharad's training. Minerva loves me enough to hurt me, and be hurt by me. Even this slap was delivered out of love for me and love for Hermione._  
  
Minerva was shaking her head. He released her now, and she returned to her chair and sank down. "But -- but -- if her father -- Severus, _why_ would she take you as her -- her -- and Ron --"  
  
"Why did she take me as her lover? I will never completely understand that, I think. She's said things to me; mumbled them in her sleep, sometimes --" At Minerva's hawkish look he had the grace to flush. "I won't dissemble any longer. We slept together many times. She stayed in my rooms, all those nights you thought she was studying somewhere else. The sex...seemed to help her. Helped her control...something within her, I believe. Sex with me, and the druid training." He sat down again and rubbed his hands over his face tiredly. "I thought at first she was confusing me with her father, making me into something different, something...horrible...something she couldn't escape, perhaps didn't _want_ to escape. But she made herself clear on one point, that day we visited the Grangers, the day I learned to my cost how much like her father I am -- in the way that I love her, want her, need her mind and her body -- she was clear. I am not her father. She chose me herself. She was not confused, and had no illusions about me. I was unclean enough to be seduced by her, and yet clean enough to be her lover, to seduce _her_."  
  
"This is all very strange," Minerva said. "Hard to take in. Severus, why did you get involved with her? She is your student. It's forbidden. Why didn't you simply come to me, as you have before?"  
  
His lips tightened. "Because...because I needed her to waken my Circle. I needed her for my religion. I could not resist that, and it grew from there. It takes two, Minerva, male and female, to wake that Circle, to call down Needfire. It needn't involve sex, not for the moon rituals -- which is where we started! -- but it does take two." His hands clenched. "I could not give that up, and so I kept her however I was able. On her terms."  
  
Minerva stared at him. "It's never simple with you, is it, Severus. You couldn't just be a Death Eater. You had to become a spy. You couldn't just be a druid, you had to involve your student. You couldn't just be a teacher at Hogwarts, you had to have a cause. What will you want next?"  
  
"Here's the thing, Minerva. I want your help. I need to reach Potter, and Weasley, and Malfoy. The Circle provides protection, once it's awakened, to those within it. Even while they're outside the Circle, for a while, at least. I need to protect Voldemort's targets at Hogwarts. Hermione is safe enough for now, at St. Mungo's, but if she should return to Hogwarts, she'll need that protection as well."  
  
"You want to drag _more students_ into this fantasy world of yours, this... _religion_?"  
  
"Yes, and you as well. As I said...it takes two, male and female."  
  
"You've gone mad, Severus. I think you should be in St. Mungo's with Hermione. No, I will not help you in this scheme of yours!"  
  
"Just let me show you," he said. "Just once, you and I. We will call the Needfire -- we can do it tonight, _now_ , in fact, it needn't be dawn or dusk though those times are strongest. We will waken the Circle, and you will see. Voldemort has no knowledge of this new weapon against him, and the sooner we protect Potter and Malfoy from his predations, the better."  
  
Minerva bridled and began to sputter. "If you think I'm going to -- to -- _mate_ \-- with you, Snape --"  
  
 _Back to Snape again, are we?_ "I told you, wakening the Circle needn't involve sex. We won't be performing the ancient fertility rituals. Unlike Hermione, I'm not taking you as my apprentice -- nor any of the others -- you won't be learning Druid ways. But you _will_ learn to wake the Circle, and call the Needfire, and together we'll protect these children. Merlin knows, Dumbledore is doing enough to put them in harm's way; it's why he wouldn't transfer Hermione, why he kept her at Hogwarts after you discovered us. And now, Minerva...let me talk to you about Voldemort's plans, and you'll see exactly why you need to do as I say. We haven't much time...he's coming for everyone just before graduation this spring; I don't know why yet. But I'm beginning to believe that he has a secret following at the school, and those students need to be as strong as possible in order to defeat the rest of us, which means they will continue with lessons until he's ready to strike."  
  
"Death Eater students, at Hogwarts?" she whispered.  
  
He spoke softly, as well. "I think so, yes. You must remember, I was one once, my sixth and seventh years. But these students have been kept secret, even from me. I have to wonder how much Voldemort suspects me." Snape drew his chair closer to hers, and began to speak even more softly. "Now...here are my plans, Hermione helped me to make them, and you must keep them secret from Dumbledore until I say you can tell him..."


	31. The Girl Whose Heart Is the Shape of a City

"I had no choice but to hear you  
You stated your case time and again  
I thought about it  
...  
I've never wanted something rational  
I am aware now  
I am aware now"

\-- Head Over Feet, Alanis Morissette

Chloe was sitting on the windowsill, legs drawn to her lean frame, now closed like a fisted hand. While Hermione's own body had often felt like a burden -a mass of flesh, bones, muscles and tendons that needed to be constantly trained in order to be as invisible and obedient as possible -Chloe used her body much like a Platonic idea: Chloe Nott's body as Chloe Nott's ideal realization. The long flexible limbs; the elastic, thin frame- flexing and arching to host its owner; her expressive face altering and changing to reflect every shift of her mood. She carried her body gracefully, moved inside it like a gastropod moves within its shell: as if it was her home.

At first, Hermione found the other girl intimidating, holding her hollow-eyed pet to her body and making it known that if Hermione couldn't bear the drooling disgrace in their room, she might as well find herself another place to sleep.

Six months earlier she would have accepted the offer and stumbled out of the four poster bed in her weakened state. But after falling in love with a man who washed his hair with a bar of soap, she had been changed. Why is it that you say you gave me nothing of substance, Snape? She thought bitterly. You offered me everything of substance, and not only in your white arms and your greasy hair. You have broken all my paradigms, so they can be rebuilt again. So that I could see the mercy in Chloe Nott's eyes when she holds Jervy- so that I could see how beautiful they are. Even if we are never to reunite in this world, I'll be grateful to you.

And so she nodded, and accepted Chloe Nott and Jervy Skyhalter, two of the lepers, two of the Severus Snapes of this world, into her life.

She supposed she would never be fond of Jervy: his eyes, huge and haunted in their empty depths, were the kind of thing to follow a person into their nightmares. Not to mention his permanent fixture of drool, set in the right corner of his mouth, which made her shudder whenever she looked at him. Nevertheless, he was a quiet, introverted creature, and hardly ever pestered her. He would sit for hours on Chloe's bed, staring into space or chewing on his fingernails, purring at the tall girl's casual petting.

Chloe, however, was different. From her first evening on the ward, when nearly all of the place's inhabitants attempted to sneak into their shared room in order to get to know the new girl, Hermione realized Chloe had a certain charisma that made people obey her. She wasn't a social leader- the blue-eyed girl was too grumpy and isolated to attain the kind of popularity Patil or Brown had in Hogwarts. She did make, however, her own social center -a social north, perhaps -in her righteousness, brilliance and beauty. Looking at her, Hermione wondered whether it was her own simple looks that prevented her -although her discernable similarity to Chloe -from becoming the similar kind of persona among her peers in Hogwarts.

Nevertheless, she did not fool herself into thinking so. Distanced enough from her younger self to view it with more objective eyes, she could see the thing that Chloe Nott lacked but that Hermione had in abundance: ostentation. Chloe was not a show-off: she seemed to have never felt the same urge to prove herself, and so, was never laughed at because of her intelligence the way Hermione so often had been.

Chloe was bitter and angry, expressing her emotions with a clarity Hermione had never allowed herself to demonstrate, and in Chloe's sincerity was something... charming. Or perhaps it had been Chloe herself that was charming. It was hard to tell. Perhaps it was Hermione who found Chloe's outspoken manner charming: so much like a boy's.

In a sense, Chloe was a boy locked inside a girl's body. Even her occasional frenzy of movement was boyish.

She supposed Chloe's resemblance to a boy might have been the thing to finally make the idea of befriending a girl possible. This, and the fact this certain girl was not the prettifying, giggling, slithering type, who would wear a beautiful skin of lush make-up in the morning only to replace it with another the following day.

In retrospect, she had no idea how they became friends. There was no specific point -no certain occasion that united them -and Hermione never acquired the ability to make new friends. When she occasionally wrote to Snape -a one-sided correspondence she had initiated in which she would update him concerning her progress -she found herself talking about this as well:

"When I think about it, " she would write. "I realize I am a complete ignoramus when it comes to human interactions. Sitting here on one of the overstuffed armchairs (as if 'overstuffed' means 'comfortable', I tell you!) placed all over the ward and watching the other teens mingle, I am only able to decipher this fine social game in scientific language, and even this, only if I try hard. They seem to me like a flock of peacocks in their courting season, circling each other, estimating each other; each gentle swish of the eyelashes meant to stimulate a certain reaction. I am tracing patterns while they-they are dancing their small, silly minuets, unaware of the social cripple lurking among them, watching with their drool flooded eyesג€¦"

She was groping, casting about, feeling her way in the dark towards the one person in many years to have captured her attention. Nevertheless, saying she wished to befriend Chloe Nott simply because she found the other girl interesting and sharp, would have been an exaggeration. There was an end to her own existence; a sharp, hollow chasm, that needed to be filled. It is not good that the man should be alone, she remembered. Hermione Granger, or so it seemed, was no exception to this rule.

Nor, luckily, was Chloe Nott. For the first few days, they would lay in their beds at night, talking in hushed voices so as not to be heard by the crew. They didn't talk about personal topics, mainly because of Hermione -who did not know, didn't want to- could not… she wasn't sure -share the intimate details of her life with someone she barely knew. Chloe, however, did make a point of telling her the exact nature of her illness.

"People come and go," she remembered Chloe's husky, not unpleasant alto reaching her in the abysmal darkness of her first night in the ward. "I am bound to stay. Jervy and Chloe, together forever. Muggle call it Catatonic Schizophrenia," she said at last. "I don't think it actually has a wizarding name. I suppose a schizophrenic wizard would be A Very Crazy Person. It's an ancient family curse, passed down every three generations- the Notts have a nasty streak in them. I believe my uncle is serving the current Dark Lord if you need proof of our nature. One time, an ancestor went too far, and angered the powers of light. The dragon cursed him, so no one, ever again, would be tempted to repeat his mistake. He was twenty-four at the time he was cursed, and healthy as a bull. By the time he was forty, his cognition was erased so that he became no more than a drooling, motionless babe in the body of a forty-year old; a muscle in his cheek twitching hysterically and his hands shaking. This is the fate awaiting me, if I ever left St. Mungo's power shield."

Hermione blinked. Then blinked again, looking for Chloe's features sketched by the pale moonlight. "But can't you... can't you... not even for several hours... every now and then?"

"What for?" the other girl said quietly. "So that I can be intoxicated by what can never be mine? The power shield is only useful as long as it's permanent. And I would only be taunting myself, breaking out every several months for few hours of delusional freedom, only to come back here. Leave it, Granger, it's no good."

Then they were back discussing Kant's introductions to metaphysics, and Chloe's husky voice brightened again, as she began to carefully set her arguments.

It was the blue-eyed girl's intellectual fitness that made Hermione comfortable enough to finally disclose certain parts of her story to her. Not much at first -she had only been in the ward for several days, and she was just beginning to acclimatize -but enough to reinforce the shaky, intellectual foundations of their relationship.

Words- she had always been so clever with hers, emptying flasks full of words over blank parchments. But then, it must have been something more that she did not know how to do and Chloe did- the fine art of toning and outstretching them, winding paragraphs of ivy around a person so they were enthralled. Was this befriending? The mere extension of writing an essay to Professor Binns? Hermione shook her head, knowing she head never felt so insecure attempting to write an essay to her History of Magic Professor. She did fear, however, Chloe Nott's rejection.

Pure-blood though she was, Chloe seemed to lack her kind's detestation of Muggle-borns and half-bloods, and thus seemed indifferent to Hermione's heritage. When asked about the matter, she only shrugged, saying prejudice is a matter of education and not of birth. "Amanda is more of a mother to me than my real mother," she said quietly. "And she's half-blood."

Hermione sighed. "I wish some of my classmates would have seen it the way you do."

There was a stifled titter from the other bed.

"What is it?" she inquired.

"I tell you Amanda is like a mother to me and you talk about your classmates."

"Are you insinuating I am self-centered?"

"No, no," Chloe whispered, though there was affection in her tone. "You arenג€™t self-centered, and you are not egotistic. You areג€¦" and her voice somehow sharpened, yet gained that certain crispiness of deep concentration. "You have ears, but somehow you can't hear my longing. You're not egotistical, Granger, just blind to me. Too full of yourself to contain the notion of me as well."

She swallowed. "I'm sorry, I won't bother you with my-"

Chloe cut across her. "Don't be an idiot. I want you to bother me. I enjoy our conversations. Now tell me more about Hogwarts- tell me how you viewed the Wizarding World as a Muggle-born. Tell me about those classmates, who won't understand."

And she did. She told Chloe about the need to prove herself; about the mocking Slytherins and Draco Malfoy who had taunted them from the first ride in the Hogwarts express. She told her about being friendless; shunned; lonely; laughed at, and about befriending Harry and Ron due to a set of bizarre circumstances, which was her salvation. The following night, she told Chloe about the Dark Lord and being Harry Potter's friend; about the Chamber of Secrets and the summer in Grimmauld Place, when she could no longer take it and cut herself. Then she told her about the training program and Ron. Chloe, in return, talked about her life in the hospital, her relationship with the crew: about Jervy, who was like a brother to her, and mostly, about Amanda, who would never be her mother, and yet, was the closest thing to a mother she would ever have. It was two more days before she reached Snape and Hermione's Druid training, and the other girl, seated on the windowsill had looked longingly into the distance, her index finger writing obscure patterns on the frost-covered glass.

Moonbeams filtering through the enchanted windowpane touched Chloe's cheek. They entwined in her hair like solid carbon dioxide and poured into the collar of her shirt, much like the enraptured gazes of teenaged boys. At this hour of the night, it was only the two of them in the small room, and Chloe would become pensive. She would remove the charm concealing the city from the window with a flick of her wand, and her eyes drifting with longing, she would sit for long hours on the windowsill. Sometimes she talked to Hermione; sometimes she simply sat there quietly, allowing the hushed sounds ascending from the city and filtering through the enchanted glass to envelop her whole being.

"What is it like to have sex?" Chloe wanted to know, one night.

There was no topic, she learned quickly, that her roommate was embarrassed to discuss. Whenever Hermione found herself baffled or blushing, Chloe would only lift her brow, sometimes clenching her chin, reminding the other girl she had no such privilege, or otherwise daring her to talk about the subject. She hardly giggled- it never occurred to Chloe Nott there was something worth giggling about, which Hermione found refreshing. However, her lips would usually curl in amusement and both of her eyebrows would rise up, as if saying: really, I can't believe that!

Never before had she met a girl like Chloe, and she drank in her company, absorbing her with inebriating, inflamed gulps, as if it was a thirst impossible to slake, and yet sometimes, when Chloe looked at her like that, her eye like two open palms with all her words scattered, Hermione would find herself retreating to her own body, another metaphorical shell: one meant to conceal and obscure rather then reveal and emphasize. "To have sex?" she echoed Chloe's question.

"Yes," the other girl nodded. "How is it to have sex? To have another person inside your body."

"It... depends," she answered after a while. "I won't be prudish- I love sex. I need sex. Not merely masturbation, but the meeting of bodies... of... what you said, having another person inside me. I have my own issues. Perhaps it's my own way of being touched, I don't know. It's different, you see. Masturbating and fucking. Having sex with a partner is the full realization of the act while masturbation is merely reaching an orgasm -much like reading the edited version of a text in comparison to the full version -andג€¦" She frowned. "Don't you ever feel these cravings? You know, for having... something inside you? When you touch yourself, that something is not... not as it should be?"

Chloe moistened her lips. "I think I do."

"Well, that's it, I suppose. That's sex, to have this void, these cravings, fulfilled. But then, there is bad sex, and there is good sex, and there is sex with someone you love, and sex with someone who understands you, and those are...altogether different things."

They immersed into a fluid, shadow-swept silence, tinted with the voices ascending from the city, four floors below them.

"Why do you want to know?" Hermione asked after a while.

"I am a hormonal eighteen-year old, now aren't I?" Chloe mocked herself, then her features sharpened in concentration, and she sobered at once. "When you spoke about your Professor-" she began, clearly contemplating her words, "you were more alive than I have ever felt. You are... your face glowed with your enthusiasm. I never felt the urge to slit my wrists," she admitted. "I had bursts of spiritual shredding before I was moved to St. Mungo's, but I suspect that even so... my gulf isn't as abysmal or as dark as yours. But neither is my exultation-" The curly-headed girl wiped her eyes, uttering a bitter laugh. "You infect me with your longing, is all. I should have known better."

* * *

"No." Two of Chloe's long, wide knuckled fingers tapped on Jervy's head, which rested in her lap. The boy only gurgled, and snuggled closer. "I disagree with you," she added. "Just because Arithmancy determines the numeric breakdown of certain kinds of wizardry, it doesn't mean it can also set scientific parameters to magic. Your attempt to compare Arithmancy to arithmetic is erroneous."

Hermione breathed in frustration. "But don't you see? Once we are able to relate to all branches of magic in one language, idiom and numbers, it automatically places Arithmancy as-"

A light tap on the partially opened door of their room (in the ward, she learned, all doors, aside from the lavatory's must be kept open) cut the flow of their conversation. Lifting her eyes, her gaze fell on a short, lean trainee who had been working in the ward for six months now, and was relatively liked by the place's inhabitants.

"We're talking, Patrick," grumbled Chloe.

"Why, hello to you too, Chloe," the young man answered. Both of his arms were spread, hands grasping the lintel's wooden planks. His body was hanging loosely between his arms, like a soaked piece of linen put out to dry in the open air. Smiling, he watched the two girls with something akin to the distanced, prolonged nonchalance of a teenage boy. In Hermione's estimation, he couldn't be much older than twenty-four.

Chloe gave him a contemptuous look. "Get a life."

Patrick didn't seem to take offense. The staff, she quickly learned, was used to Chloe's bursts of nastiness. All but Amanda, whose eyes would cloud for a moment before she'd shrug, her scanty lips curling in both amusement and distaste at her protégée's behaviour.

The trainee flashed another smile at them. "Of course. I would only inform Miss Granger here that she has a visitor, and I'm on my way. Hope to see both of you at dinner." And with that, he briefly detached himself from the lintel and gracefully regaining his balance, left the room and stalked up the hallway.

"Visitor?" the other girl intoned in her upper class drawl, which had often reminded Hermione of Draco Malfoy.

"Harry," she answered. "I wrote him earlier this week- we ought to remove the Fidelius Charm."

Chloe frowned. "You didn't tell me."

"I'm sorry... I totally forgot."

"Never mind." Chloe's shining crown of brown curls trembled like an organic substance as she shook her head.

"Chloe?"

"Well," she said, entwining her fingers in Jervy's sleek, dark hair. "People here wait ages for a friend's visit. But then, Granger... it might be just like you to 'totally forget' such thing. So... as aforesaid, never mind it."

She was about to protest when she noticed Chloe's eyes turn opaque, her hand stroking Jervy's head in a monitored, soulless rhythm: the doves perching in her soul flew away, or perhaps had been locked inside, flying above the breathy London of her inner body. Yes, Hermione sometimes thought- where some people had a small village, or rye field, or even a snow covered moor in their heart, Chloe's soul was the shape and the colours of a vivacious, bustling London. And it was warded and closed now, with only Chloe, Jervy and the products of Chloe's imagination roaming the rambling streets.

It then occurred to Hermione, the way it occurred to her many times on the previous days, that only a year before, she would have been tempted to convince Chloe to talk to her, would have tried to coax the city's gates open, only to fail miserably and wallow in her frustration.

She sighed. Later she might be able to explain to Chloe that Harry couldn't be specific as to his time of arrival: if he'd asked permission to leave Hogwarts grounds in order to visit her, he would have to reveal her whereabouts to at least one of the teachers. At that, her parents would doubtlessly be notified -something which she was clearly unready to do, yet. She knew that the removal of the Fidelius Charm would automatically leave her exposed, but she also knew it would take the Ministry a while before they'd start looking for her magical tracks again, not to mention that once the Fidelius was removed, her therapy could begin. She did not expect any sort of magic: at eleven, she believed the Wizarding World had a charm to make every discomfort better. Still a teen and harmed- still a teen and realistic, she didnג€™t believe in magic. Perhaps she believed in Arithmancy. But not in magic. Not anymore.

She wrote Harry the moment she decided to take Healer Morrow's offer and admit herself to St. Mungo's, asking one of the healers who worked on the ER to send the letter for her as she was too weak to do so herself. The healer, in awe when she noted the sendee's name, had immediately granted Hermione her wish. Harry, who even at the best of times wasn't an exemplary correspondent, sent her a scrabbled, excited letter, torn between the conflicting needs to maintain secrecy and spill his heart out. He promised to wait one week, then come and visit her the moment he was able to, and knowing Harry to be true to his word, Hermione had quickly forgotten about everything.

Truth be told, she had been too immersed in her own grief over the love she lost, simultaneously enthralled by the intellectual delight and emotional enigma which was Chloe, to have the mental capacity with which to contain the excitement over Harry's upcoming visit. Reminded of it, she felt tremors of anticipation creeping up her spine. The slithering snakes of fear and the fluttering doves of pleasure mixed into a hazy blend of bluish-grey uncertainty.

Rising to her feet, she made a halfhearted attempted to smooth the wrinkles in the worn-out robe she had been given until she could send for her own things. Chloe, still seated on her own bed, didn't bother to look at Hermione as she exited their room.

* * *

Harry, jumpy and as easy with a smile as ever, was waiting for her in the living area. Somehow, she mused, he managed to be a freak even in Freak-land: the one healer currently in the ward had been peering at him from the staff station, while the two patients exuberant enough to recognize the mighty Harry Potter, were unabashedly flooding him with questions. A third patient, a girl named Dorothea, simply ogled Harry, swaying on her feet in a catatonic ecstasy that probably frightened him more than the other two's enthusiastic attention.

Hermione rolled her eyes. "You ought to learn to deal with your fans someday," she told the desperate-looking Harry.

The light mirth, she knew, served to conceal much deeper emotions. Nothing, perhaps, but a thin rope stretching over an abyss, but a much-needed one at that. It could have been that the gulf was abysmal and the rope was thin only for her to tumble -because she needed to be broken upon reuniting with him. But not yet, though. She knew that facing Harry in the open, she needed at least her expression intact. Never being the thickheaded git certain people deemed him to be, Harry was also aware of it.

"Oh, well," he answered good-humouredly, "perhaps I just love being everybody's favourite guy."

She merely tapped on her lower lip. "I hardly think someone's favourite guy would enjoy your being everybody's favourite person."

He blushed, glancing at his two newfound fans that were obviously deaf to the content of their conversation. "Is there any private place we can talk?"

"Sort of."

Signing Harry to follow her and glaring at Lindsey and Grover who attempted to follow her as well uninvited, Hermione led Harry to the room she shared with Chloe at the end of the hallway.

The tall, blue-eyed girl was still angry. Hermione did not expect it to be otherwise, yet she had a favour to ask of her.

"Chloe-" she began.

No answer came.

Harry gave her a quizzical look but she made clear everything was all right. "Just give me a second," she said quietly. "I promise to explain everything later."

"Chloe," she made a second attempt. "It's important. Please talk to me."

"What, Granger?"

Hermione took a calming breath, forcing herself to think. She mustn't mess it up. "This is Harry," she said. "He is very dear to me. Harry, this is Chloe- she is very dear to me too. I would be immensely happy if you two couldג€¦" she moistened her lips. "I don't know, I suppose I would have been happy to see you two befriending under different circumstances- no, I take it back: I've had my share of triangles for a lifetime. But having you two to like each other could be nice." She knew she was babbling, and yet, could not stop herself. "Chloe," she said at last, imploring the lovely, blue-eyed girl to listen to her. "Would you please do me a favour and be angry with me later today?"

Chloe's lips curled. "You owe me."

Hermione nodded briefly. "Right. Now this is Harry."

Gently shifting Jervy, Chloe rose to her feet, coaxing the curled Jervy to stand up as well. Still somewhat drowsy, the dark haired boy followed her orders, and now the two of them stood in front of Harry Potter, unaware or uncaring as to his identity. Just a proud girl and her human pet, Hermione reflected. The Boy Who Lived was irrelevant faced with those two. Here, confronted with Chloe and Jervy, he was only Harry, and looking at his face, she suspected it was the single thing Harry Potter really wanted from people. How odd it should be, for all of us to wear masks in order to hide our true identities while all this one boy wants is to have his masks thrown away.

"Hello, Harry," She heard Chloe greeted him in her direct, dry tone. "I'm Chloe, this is Jerv. We're glad to meet you."

"G-glad," echoed Jervy.

At her side, the messy haired boy smiled. "Hello Chloe, Jervy," he said, and to Hermione's surprise, pulled a somewhat stained handkerchief out of the pocket of his robe. "A pleasure to meet you." And with that, he leaned over Jervy's twisted form, and without making any fuss, wiped the boy's mouth in a gesture that left Chloe Nott gaping.

Hermione frowned as she watched Harry straighten, absentmindedly folding his handkerchief. It had been much like watching someone's private memory as she knew this moment did not belong to her, and yet she was curious, more than curious -something much like an interested observer, knowing both of the parties involved. And so she looked for Harry's reaction, ignoring the tug of guilt claiming that she should avert her gaze.

She watched the two staring at each other. Chloe's blue, sheen coated eyes took the measure of the small, delicate looking boy, who answered her with a confused, yet thoughtful gaze. Then Harry's hand reached to wipe a trail of moisture staining Chloe's cheek, his lips forming a crooked, familiar smile. "Shall we all sit now?" he asked.

Chloe answered with a crooked smile of her own. "Sure. Granger?" she turned to Hermione, who had been leaning against the lintel.

She sighed. "Chloe, I still have something to ask of you. Better say- of Jerv."

The tall girl shrugged her shoulders. "Ask him, then."

She made an effort to suppress her repulsed expression. She might have actually partially succeeded, as Chloe didn't seem angrier than she usually did on such occasions. "You know he won't listen to anyone but you, Chloe."

Her retort was a sharp glare. "Fine, Granger. What do you want from Jerv?"

"I need him to patrol the hallway- let us know if anyone shows up. No one can hear what Harry and I are about to say. Absolutely no one."

"Oh," Chloe gave her a scornful look. "And what about me? Are you about to banish me from the room?"

She shook her head. "You I trust. But I want you to swear on your wand you're not going to tell any detail of this conversation to anyone. Not even to Amanda."

"Come, on, Granger!" the other girl snared. "Don't be such a drama queen."

"I'm not," she answered quietly. "If anything of what Harry and I are going to say to each other would leave this room, our lives and other people's lives would be at risk. You know who Harry is; you remember everything I told you about my history in Hogwarts. Don't play the innocent with me."

Chloe exhaled slowly, her stomach flattening under the tricot cloth of her shirt. "Very well. I swear to you on my wand that not a word you say here will leave this room. Jerv," she said, tilting her head towards the small boy. "Come here. I need you to do something for me."

"Sג€¦sure," stuttered the drooling, little monkey-boy, lips twisting and humping in a pitiable attempt to mimic human speech.

Wide-eyed he stared at his mistress as she explained what was wanted of him, then hopped up the hallway, seated himself on the parquet floor and howled at anybody who dared to roam too close to the last room.

Harry smiled. "He's cute."

Chloe's face brightened at once: a candle flickering behind the temporary illusion of her face. For a moment, Hermione was almost envious of Harry's ability to cause her friend this kind of joy, then felt petty and wretched in her jealousy. The love I have known was so great, that all I am capable of now are small, trivial emotions, she reflected sarcastically. Well, Snape, nothing about you can be simple, now can it? I miss you so fucking much.

Blinking back her tears, she retreated to sit on her bed, her thoughts fallen like scattered parchments on the floor. Distracted, she didn't notice Harry had crawled to lie down besides her, resting his head in her lap, or that she had been clutching the hand he offered her; damp and warm and inspiring an odd sense of security. Only after a while did it occur to her, and she was surprised to understand his proximity had been tolerable, as if some pricking edge inside her-this tooth she had to keep tonguing when she was younger even though she knew she mustn't -had grown numb.

Chloe, at her other side, was absentmindedly playing with Harry's messy hair, running her fingers through the soft, fine locks.

"Well." Rolling on his back, Harry scanned her through the thick lenses of his spectacles. Trying them on, once, she had been overwhelmed to realise that without his eyeglasses, the boy who lived was practically blind.

"Well what?" she snapped.

"It's been a while."

"Yes."

"I figuredג€¦" he began, "I thought he was good for you."

"He was."

Harry moistened his lips. "Then... why?"

She was trying to figure out a why to speak without letting the anguish distort her features. It was impossible. Giving up at last, she felt every muscle in her face screw up, angry that there would be no relief in letting go. "Perhaps... perhaps the cupboard- perhaps it's simply too deep." Breathing, Hermione felt tremors moving through her body. "Too dark."

A muscle in Harry's jaw clenched. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be," she told him. "It's water under the bridge now."

He shook his head. "You know it isn't. You know it's never going to be."

"Still, I don't want to talk about it. Why don't you tell me about Draco?"

Biting on his lower lip, he frowned. "I don't know if we talk about the things that really matters, or if we simply try to ignore them."

"Perhaps we do both," she answered quietly. Chloe, at her side, was staring at the window, where an invisible, silenced London was bustling away behind an enchanted glass.

"Yes," Harry nodded. "I suppose I can understand that. I missed you a lot, you know?"

She returned the nod. "I missed you a lot as well, though I did not know it at the time. I'm glad you came, Harry."

He smiled. "Glad to be here."


	32. Breaking the Rules

_hide,poor dishonoured mind  
who thought yourself so wise  
and much could understand  
concerning no and yes:  
if they've become the same  
it's time you unbecame  
  
where climbing was and bright  
is darkness and to fall  
(now wrong's the only right  
since brave are cowards all)  
therefore despair,my heart  
and die into the dirt  
  
\-- from"now does our world descend "  
\-- e.e.cummings_  
  
  
  
  
Snape wakened in Angharad's double bed, thrashing, snorting, feeling as if he were choking. His hands flew to his throat and found something heavy and hairy there. His fingers clenched on the thing and he was rewarded by a fearsome yowling, and a set of claws raking his hand, followed by two clawed back feet launching Crookshank's orange body from his chest.  
  
" _Merlin!_ " Snape gasped, bringing his hand to his mouth. "Damnable kneazle." He rolled over and glared at the cat, who sat in a puddle of early morning sun in the middle of the bedroom floor. Crookshanks glared right back and then lifted his back leg over his head and proceeded to clean his rear end. "I'll have no 'git' comments from you, either," Snape informed the cat. "You needn't expect to sleep on me, now that your mistress is elsewhere."  
  
But Snape knew that Crookshanks had been doing exactly that, or at least sleeping curled next to him, since Hermione left. He'd also been allowing the cat to curl in his lap in the evening while he read his Potions journals. It was oddly comforting to have something of Hermione's still here with him. Soon enough there would be nothing of hers left in Angharad's cottage, except the few letters he'd had from her since she was admitted to St. Mungo's. Letters that he devoured anew, all three of them, each morning with his stewed black tea and porridge and fruit, and the occasional bacon or kipper he ate because he knew she expected him to increase his protein intake. He recalled her mentioning to him how different -- healthier -- his skin tasted to her, after the week at Malfoy Manor, eating properly balanced meals at Narcissa's table. He didn't notice a difference, but he continued to try and make an effort, and thought perhaps he felt better, except for the hole in that chamber of his heart and the loss of Hermione, his oxygen.  
  
Minerva had agreed to tend to Crookshanks until Hermione was released from St. Mungo's. Snape was simply being called too often to Voldemort's side as the planning proceeded at a more and more rapid pace. The last summons had seen him gone for almost three days, and by the time he returned, Crookshanks had eaten what food Snape had left out for him, then moved on to hunt the garden for mice and other small animals, and eaten them all on the hearth in the kitchen, leaving a mess of hair, ears, and bloody tails on the bricks.  
  
Two weeks ago, after convincing Minerva to meet him at the Hogs Head Inn, he had also convinced her to go with him to the Circle, and together they raised the Needfire. He had used her brooch to draw blood from his finger, and the Needfire had come to burn the bluebells he'd picked in the edge of the Forbidden Forest as they walked to the Circle. Minerva had been astounded by the vortex, pressing against it, learning its strength, turning wide eyes to him in the semi-darkness lit by the bluish Needfire on the altar. She had hurled spell after spell at the barrier, never able to break it. Snape had her fire breaking spells into the dome of the Circle as well, to prove to her that the vortex enclosed the space inside.  
  
Afterwards, they stood near the altar stone, watching as the Needfire finished consuming the offering, and Snape told her all he knew about Voldemort's plans.  
  
"You should be telling Headmaster Dumbledore these things," Minerva chided him.  
  
"He endangers the students to further his own agenda. I'll not support that any longer."  
  
"Because it endangers Hermione -- your lover -- specifically?" Minerva gave him a sharp, ugly look.  
  
"Yes, if you must know, that was the final blow to the wedge, but I also care that he's endangering Malfoy, Weasley and Potter. And all the other students and teachers here. Minerva, I need you to do something for me."  
  
"What now?" Her voice was cold; though she had been impressed by the display the Circle made, she was still very angry at Snape.  
  
He fumbled in his pocket and pulled out a roll of parchment. "Get this to Potter for me. I need to explain some things to him; and I need to teach him about this Circle. It will protect him. I want them -- all of them, and you, as well -- here again in three days' time. We will raise the Needfire again, and the force will protect the boys from Voldemort's depredations and surveillance."  
  
"I will read this before I decide whether or not I will give it to Potter."  
  
Snape bowed his head and sighed. "As I expected." He looked over his shoulder; the Needfire had all but consumed the bluebells, and he could feel the whirling vortex dying down. He rose and walked to the Stones, pressing his hand through the force there. "Come, Minerva. I will see you safely back to Hogwarts."  
  
They walked through the cold darkness without speaking until the light from a high castle window fell yellow onto their path. Minerva halted him in its glow with a hand on his arm. "You say Voldemort is aware of the force, the 'white noise' around you. Once you raise that protective shield around the boys, he will know you're a traitor, Severus."  
  
"I am aware of that," he said tensely. "You let me worry about that, Minerva. Just bring me the boys three evenings from now."  
  
She turned to leave, and he called her back. "There is one last thing."  
  
She did not turn, but she paused. "Yes?"  
  
"I want to bring you Hermione's familiar. I can't care for him properly with Voldemort summoning me so frequently."  
  
"Bring him with you when you come back. He can stay with me, if he will."  
  
"Thank you. Hermione will be pleased."  
  


~*~

  
  
Well before the three days had passed, Snape received a message carried by a snowy owl. The scrawl was familiar. Feet upon feet of punishment essays and Snape's personal resentment of Lily's boy ensured that he would always recognize Potter's handwriting. Potter confirmed they would all meet at the Circle at the agreed-upon time.  
  
And...there was news of Hermione. Potter had been to see her and take her some of her things from Hogwarts. Snape sank into a chair, absently holding out a kipper to the white owl. He read the simple statements over and over.  
  
"Hermione asked me, if I got the opportunity, to mention that she's doing better, fitting in, getting along with her roommate, and missing you. I've done as she asked."  
  
Snape stared out the kitchen window for a long time before he remembered to send the owl away, no reply required.  
  


~*~

  
  
Only Snape could tell how angry Minerva was about having brought the three students out of Hogwarts so close to curfew on a school night, especially to bring them to a monster like Snape. The three youths trailed her curiously. When they arrived at the Circle, Snape was already dressed in his druid robes and feathered cloak.  
  
Malfoy snickered, but stopped when Snape fixed him with an unblinking stare, more than apparent in Minerva's _Lumos_ light. "Mr Malfoy. I may no longer be your professor or your Head of House, but as a superior wizard I require your respect. Your father would not approve of your lack of manners."  
  
"Professor," began Weasley, but then stopped.  
  
Snape waited, watching. In the red-head's eyes was a new confidence, and a new look of distaste and disrespect. Of course -- Snape was no longer in a position of unassailable authority.  
  
Weasley's head swung toward Minerva. "Professor McGonagall, why have you brought us here?" His chin jutted towards Malfoy. "And why is _he_ here?"  
  
"Bugger off, Weasel," said Malfoy, from the corner of his mouth. He was standing far from Potter, where he could watch his lover; Weasley stood immediately next to Potter.  
  
Minerva's lips thinned. "Draco. Ron. Immaturity ill becomes you. Three points from each house. Ron, you'll have to ask Professor Snape why he asked me to bring you here."  
  
Reluctantly Weasley looked back at Snape. "Sir?" he said, slowly, grudgingly, almost a sneer curling his lip. _I see you are remembering a certain evening in autumn when I caught you snogging my apprentice_ , thought Snape.  
  
"You are all here because I asked Professor McGonagall to bring you here. Now, no more talking until the ritual is complete. It is foolishly dangerous to speak at this time."  
  
"Why?" demanded Ron. "Why should we trust you, of all people? I know what you did to Hermione, you bastard. I know why she's in St. Mungo's -- it's because of you! Why you're not in Azkaban right now, I'll never know, and --"  
  
"Ronald Weasley!" expostulated Minerva. "Silence!" The red-head glared at her, but her pointing finger did not waver, and he subsided; Snape was still well aware of the young giant's fists clenching and unclenching at his sides. A moment later Weasley crossed his arms over his chest and thrust his hands into his armpits, and looked away from Snape.  
  
Snape's gaze slid to Potter, who in all this time had said nothing. The youth knew more than he was telling. Snape swung the cloak off his shoulders and held it out to Potter. "Miss Granger told me she taught you the ritual this past winter. Come and demonstrate with Professor McGonagall so that your classmates may learn by your example."  
  
Potter looked at Snape warily, but came forward, pushing his glasses up his nose. Weasley came with him, standing on his right. Snape stood by with his sickle; he would not require Potter to wound himself; Snape's blood would suffice. And since the more blood that was spilled, the greater the protection afforded, Snape had in mind to supply more than four small drops this time.  
  
Potter motioned to Malfoy to join them. He stepped aside to make room for the blond on his left, who moved instead to stand between Snape and Minerva. Snape was not the only one to observe Potter's hurt look; it didn't last long, but Weasley had seen it, and looked sharply at the youth standing next to him. "You don't need him," hissed Weasley, prodding Potter in the ribs with his elbow. Potter looked first startled, and then annoyed; his green eyes glared at Malfoy, who, for the first time in Snape's recent memory, shifted his weight uneasily. The boy's grey eyes slid to Weasley and narrowed into slits of displeasure.  
  
 _So Weasley does not know about your lover, Potter,_ thought Snape. _Malfoy wishes to be at your right hand, to displace your best friend. How much longer can you keep your relationship a secret?_  
  
Potter began the ritual, with Minerva standing on the opposite side of the altar stone, rigid with disapproval but participating nonetheless. At the proper time, Snape sliced open the heel of his hand and let a thin stream of blood splash over the small pile of apple wood and bluebells he had placed there.  
  
"Sir -- " began Potter, aghast, at the same time as Minerva gasped Snape's name.  
  
"So much blood?" she demanded.  
  
"More blood, more protection," Snape spat harshly. "Get on with it, Mr Potter."  
  
"Let him bleed to death," sneered Weasley. "We'd all be better off. It's not like the wizard world _needs_ Slytherins running everything --"  
  
Potter turned towards him. "Shut up, Ron. You don't know what you're talking about. And unfortunately, _I do._ And so does Hermione. And so does Snape, greasy git or not." Dumbfounded and confused, as uneasy as Malfoy, Weasley blinked and quieted.  
  
And moments later, Potter flung his arms skyward and down came the Needfire, bursting, sparking, shimmering through the offering of fresh grass and newly-budded twigs. The feathered cape lifted at Potter's shoulders and began to lash ferociously. Snape put the heel of his hand to his mouth to stanch the blood. Weasley and Malfoy stood staring at the blue flames on the altar, stunned.  
  
"All of you. Go to the Stones, and feel the vortex of force that we have created. Try to escape the Circle. You need to know what it feels like, and you should also know the force rings meet overhead, forming a cage of sorts." He looked directly at Potter. "Open the clasp of that cape and you'll see what I mean."  
  
Potter's thin hand slipped the toggle free and the cape swirled higher and higher, until at last it circled overhead like a trapped tiger, unable to escape.  
  
"Oi," said Weasley. "Look at that. It's flying. And it can't get out!"  
  
Snape's lip curled at this uncreative assessment. "Yes, Mr Weasley. Now do as I bade you."  
  
Minerva grabbed for Snape's hand and began passing her wand over it to heal the cut. "Stupid man...don't you think a few drops would have sufficed, as they did last time?"  
  
"Never forget who we're dealing with, Minerva," he muttered. "That's the mistake too many have made. He's no tame wizard. He's far from stupid, and he's the most motivated and charismatic individual I have ever met, except perhaps for Lucius Malfoy." He flexed his hand; the cut was sealed. He went himself to the Stones to test the difference in the force, and was astonished at how it threw him back; there was almost no flex to the humming wall that had risen. _More blood, more force, more protection...Angharad, I wish you were here. What else have I forgotten?_  
  
As the Needfire began to die down, Snape returned to the altar. His small crowd gathered round. "What we have done here is raise a veil between all of us and Voldemort. It means that you are protected from his sight, but it does not make you invincible, or even stronger. It just prevents him from reaching your mind, from finding you." Snape looked at each boy in turn, holding their gazes. "He has targeted each of you. You, Weasley, because you are a friend of Potter's, and mean much to him. You are a weakness of Potter's. Be conscious of that. Above all, be vigilant." He stared hard at Hermione's young Thor, who, surprisingly, met his gaze and nodded back before taking a step closer to Potter. It was clear to Snape: Weasley would do whatever Potter needed him to do, and take his cues from the green-eyed boy. _Good,_ thought Snape. _Potter will need your strength._  
  
His gaze moved to Malfoy. "You, Malfoy, because you are your father's son, and Voldemort hopes to learn Dumbledore's secrets through you now that I am no longer a professor here. You would do well to remember that there is nothing glamorous about becoming a Death Eater, regardless of what you may have heard. You would simply be the tool of the Dark Lord, to do his dirty work. It is beneath you, Draco Malfoy, and your father wishes you not to follow him in this one thing." Malfoy stood very still, meeting Snape's gaze seriously while he spoke.  
  
And finally, Lily's boy. _James'_ son. Dumbledore's not-so-secret weapon against Voldemort. Snape's lip curled faintly, but after the boy's skill at the ritual, he had to admit a grudging respect. Hermione would not have had time to teach the ritual more than once before she left Hogwarts to find Snape, yet he had not faltered over the words or the timing.  
  
"Potter. Take what you have learned here and use it well," Snape said, simply. He looked very hard at Potter. "Because you love, and love strongly, you are weakened, you are vulnerable." His gaze flicked to Malfoy, and back to Potter, aware that Weasley's sharp eyes followed that telling glance. "Remember that. But remember too, that Voldemort loves _nothing_."  
  
The feathered cloak descended to earth slowly. Weasley waited for it to get within his tall reach, then caught it and returned it to Snape. "You are all free to go," said Snape. The boys began to leave the Circle. Snape called Malfoy back. "Malfoy. A moment, if you please."  
  
The white-blond boy paused at the edge of the Circle. His stance told Snape that he was uneasy how much of his relationship with Potter Snape had shared. It was clear Weasley had not been told that Potter was sleeping with Malfoy. And Snape had all but told.  
  
"Here, please," said Snape. Malfoy approached with apparent confidence. Snape, after all, was his former Head of House. What had he to fear? Snape had been sacked for shagging a student, not injuring one. And a Gryffindor at that. Snape caught him above the elbow in a firm grip.  
  
"Here now, Professor --" began Malfoy hotly. "Just because --"  
  
Snape's wand whipped out before the boys or Minerva could react, and touched Malfoy in the center of his forehead. " _Obliviate_ ," he intoned. An instant later Potter's hand shot between them and knocked Snape's wand away from Malfoy.  
  
"What do you think you're doing?" Potter hissed, green eyes glittering in fury in his wandlight.  
  
"Touch my wand again, _boy_ , and you'll no longer be the Boy-who-lived. Your lover tells his father too much. You would do well to remember that. And in turn, Lucius must tell Voldemort what he knows when the Dark Lord asks. It's best if Malfoy doesn't remember what went on here tonight. Do you understand me, _boy_?"  
  
Potter stared him down. Neither flinched away, but at last Snape saw a grudging realization emerge in Potter's eyes. "Good," said Snape. Then he lowered his voice. "Allow me to suggest that an intense...embrace...might provide an adequate replacement memory." He wrapped his feathered cape close and stalked out of the Circle, leaving Potter staring after him, astonished. It amused him to have shocked Potter by knowing about his relationship with Malfoy. As he passed Minerva on his way to the edge of Hogwarts grounds to Apparate home, he said, "Bring them back in two weeks."  
  
"Was that really necessary, using _Obliviate_ against Draco?"  
  
"When will you learn we're not dealing with Dumbledore here? Voldemort is never _twinkly_ , Minerva. He'll do what he pleases, what he thinks will serve him best. If that means going through Malfoy to get to Potter, that will be done. It's best that Malfoy not remember what happened here tonight."  
  
"How long do you think you can manage this, Severus?" she asked, her voice harsh.  
  
"For as long as I must," he said. He paused outside the Circle long enough to give her Crookshanks' carrier, with the angry cat inside.  
  


~*~

  
  
"Snape -- you will stay. The rest of you -- leave us." Voldemort's voice was like ice, ringing high and thin as crystal. Snape waited at the Dark Lord's side while the rest of the Death Eaters donned their masks and filed out of the meeting place.  
  
 _Severus, an afternoon in bed, not so long ago: "What are you doing? What magic is this?"  
  
Hermione moved slowly beneath him, her eyes clouded with the strength of the magic she was working. "Warding you. Someone must watch your arse, if you won't do it."_  
  
Only now there was no one to ward him. He must watch his own arse. Voldemort's eyes were maddened and red, like a bull's. Better to get it over with, whatever was to come. "My lord." He stood with his head down, eyes on the serpent wizard's feet, allowing his peripheral vision to show him what was happening.  
  
"Snape, Snape, my...loyal...follower."  
  
"My lord," said Snape again.  
  
"Not only have you not rid yourself of that white noise, that shield around your mind, but it has apparently been spreading like a plague at Hogwarts."  
  
Snape waited, his heart in his throat, beating hard and frantically like the wings of a trapped dove. It did not do to interrupt Voldemort when he was setting the stage for a dramatic cursing or two. Snape was sure this summons would end in Cruciatus for him.  
  
"I am unable to see through the eyes of Malfoy's son. I am unable to connect with Potter's mind. There is another there, a friend of Potter's, someone close to him. And again I am locked out. What do you know about this, Snape?"  
  
Snape kept his eyes on the floor. "My lord, you know well that Dumbledore is a strong wizard --"  
  
Voldemort hissed. "Do not play word games with me, Snape. _Crucio...Finite Incantatem_."  
  
It was brief, but horrifically painful nonetheless. Snape bent at his waist, gasping. His Death Eater mask fell from his hand and rocked on the floor of the meeting room. "I'm sorry, my lord," he rasped.  
  
"Yeessss, I see you are sorry. You're sorry I cursed you. You're not sorry I cannot find you to summon you. Snape, your utility has reached an end. You're no longer at Hogwarts. You haven't managed to return there, though you promised you would. You've not been able to rid yourself of that shield. And --" and here Voldemort's yew wand moved under his chin, the tip of it pressing into a tender spot near his Adam's apple. "And, my follower, you've been putting that shield around the very students I wished most to observe. What have you to say to this, before I kill you? Is there anything you could add that might make me reconsider?"  
  
Snape's eyes lifted. The wild grey blazed into the redness before him. "Yes, my lord, there is."  
  
Voldemort's eyes narrowed. "Out with it, then. My patience is wearing thin."  
  
" _Apparo_ Hogwarts front gate!"  
  
Voldemort's nearly lipless mouth stretched in a movement that was more a rictus reminiscent of a poisoning than a smile. "You forget, Snape. I do not permit Apparation within my personal perimeter."  
  
 _Fuck. And now I've given away my fear to this beast_. He thought fast, but not fast enough. Voldemort began to smile again.  
  
"I see there is nothing you can offer me."  
  
"There is one thing," said Snape desperately. "A small thing only..."  
  
"I'm waiting."  
  
"Potter has taken a lover." _Merlin, Merlin...think faster...I cannot hand him Draco..._  
  
"Really." Voldemort was bored. "Tell me something I don't know. Lucius has already told me this."  
  
"Lucius told you who Potter's lover is?"  
  
"No -- he didn't know that. Why should it matter? If I cannot see Potter, I cannot see who his lover is, therefore I cannot find the link to that one's mind. Again you fail me."  
  
"But if I can learn who it is...I will be meeting with Potter again soon; what if I could bring you this knowledge?"  
  
The wand tip moved ever so slightly away from Snape's throat. "It might be useful." Voldemort appeared to be considering the idea. Then his eyes slitted and he shook his head. "No. This is only more delaying, Snape." His wand flicked towards Snape, who fell, still conscious, but rigid and powerless in the full body bind of _Petrificus Totalus._ "Do you suppose Malfoy has arrived home already? A shame to call him back so soon, but...I think it will anger him to hear of your betrayal. And it should please him to watch you die, Snape." The wizard closed his eyes briefly, his hand over his Dark Mark; then he spoke Lucius' name. Afterward, he retired to his chair and sat, looking at Snape, and drumming his fingers on the arm of the chair.  
  
It wasn't long before Lucius appeared, looking harried and disturbed. His gaze went first to Voldemort, and he bowed. Then his head turned to Snape, still sprawled on the floor, absolutely motionless. "My lord called?" said Lucius to Voldemort.  
  
"I have decided to reward you, Lucius. You may kill Snape. He is no longer useful; in fact, I believe him to be dangerous to our cause." The serpent wizard looked idly at his long, broken nails. "Snape has turned traitor, Lucius...he has hidden Potter from my view. As he has hidden himself." The red eyes turned their full glare on Lucius. "That same white veil he has placed about himself, he has also placed about Potter and _your son._ He... _obstructs_ me."  
  
Lucius stared at Voldemort, and then at Snape. Snape watched the blond draw himself up proudly. "I would be honored, my lord. Yet --" he broke off, and shook his head.  
  
"You have a doubt, Lucius?" said Voldemort casually, one brow rising.  
  
"No, my lord. A fleeting thought, but I believe I am not correct in my thinking."  
  
 _Yes, Lucius...yes! Just break the Bind and I might have a chance.... You, though -- you will be punished yourself...._  
  
"Nevertheless. You will tell me your thoughts."  
  
Lucius paused, frowning slightly. Voldemort moved impatiently in his chair. "Lucius."  
  
"My lord...I was...merely thinking that...we might make an object lesson of this traitor; send him to Dumbledore a broken man, powerless, yet living still, and show your strength. Snape is a powerful wizard; for you to so publicly break him...yet, my lord, I think it a poor idea of mine."  
  
Voldemort's eyes slid to Snape, lingered on his face, and then returned to Lucius. "Tell me more. How would you break such a wizard as Snape?"  
  
Lucius' eyes narrowed. "I would use _Transfundo potentia_ and send him back to Hogwarts, my lord. With a broken wand."  
  
 _No. Not that. Kill me instead, don't take my magic, don't take my magic from me!_  
  
Voldemort's lipless mouth stretched once more into its parody of a smile. "It is a powerful spell, Lucius. Only one wizard has ever cast it successfully: Dumbledore's former partner, Nicholas Flamel."  
  
"I am aware of that, my lord," said Lucius. "I, of course, would never be powerful enough, which is why I thought better of the idea."  
  
"It has merit. It would speak directly to Dumbledore's foolish ear and unfounded pride." Voldemort looked directly into Snape's wide eyes. "And -- Lucius. Look. He is finally afraid." Voldemort leaned closer to Snape. "It's truly sad that it has come to this, Snape. I had such plans for you after the war."  
  
There was a long pause while Voldemort appeared to consider Lucius' suggestion. Lucius was rigidly still, watching the dark wizard. Finally he spoke. "You are the most powerful wizard of our age, my lord. Surely...surely even this spell is not beyond your capabilities. And I believe Flamel was in direct contact with the subject witch -- both by hand and by wand."  
  
 _No. No, no, no!_  
  
The yew wand lowered slowly toward Snape's chest and a murmured spell created a void in Snape's clothing, just above his heart. The cold tip of that wand touched his skin. Voldemort's claw of a hand shot out and gripped Snape's wrist. Voldemort saw the startlement in Snape's eyes. "I will surely drain you, traitor," Voldemort hissed.  
  
 _Hermione, I'm sorry_...thought Snape, feeling disconnected from reality. This simply could not be happening. _Damn you, Lucius...you couldn't have chosen anything worse to do to me. Torture and kill me, but don't take my magic! Don't take my magic. Don't..._ He knew that he would be stammering if he could speak. If he could move, he would be on his knees, or prostrate at their feet. He would abase himself, he would humiliate himself. He would grovel and beg. He would weep and plead.  
  
The red eyes closed and Voldemort's reedy voice intoned the incantation. " _Transfundo potentia! Transfundo potentia_!" The words repeated over and over in the room, and as they echoed, Snape felt something enormous inside him loosening, squirming, breaking free with the sensation of a rupturing blister; a bursting, the way the last breath exhaled from a drowning man's lungs rose for the surface of the water far, far above, silver in the dark gloom of the sea.  
  
His magic, leaving him. And under the full body bind of _Petrificus_ , he could not even cry out, could not mourn, could not protest. There was a brilliant flash in the room and Voldemort's greedy wand appeared to swallow it.  
  
The evil wizard looked down at Snape triumphantly. Snape himself felt hollow and void, and cold, standing at the edge of an emptiness such as he had never known. It was almost the worst experience of his life, second only to the moment when he had found Hermione still and cold on their bed, lying on the blood-soaked sheets, and no pulse beneath his fingertips, with the certainty of her death like a stone in his heart. _It's been such a terrible spring_ , he thought inanely. _I cannot even weep. Let me die, let me die..._  
  
In Lucius' diamond eyes Snape could see something new; something immensely strong. A strange smile curved Lucius' beautifully cut mouth.  
  
And in the red eyes of Voldemort shone triumph and glee. The evil wizard turned to Lucius. "The spell completed successfully, Lucius! I feel his strength in me -- I have Snape's magic! _I have added to my own power._ " He began to laugh and very nearly dance around the room. Coming close to Snape, he summoned the Potions master's wand and snapped it easily in his fingers. Boyishly he tossed the pieces to Lucius and said, "Take him back to his master Dumbledore, and make sure you pass along my condolences for the loss of his spy. _Finite Incantatem. Apparo!_ " With a sudden pop, the insane man vanished, leaving Snape and Lucius alone.  
  
Released from the binding, Snape struggled to his feet. "Why didn't you simply kill me as he asked, Lucius," he whispered.  
  
Lucius' head snapped around. "Speak no more, traitor." He stepped close to Snape, took firm hold of him, and apparated them both to the front gates of Hogwarts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rough Latin translation:  
> transfundo - [to pour over from one vessel into another , to transfer].  
> potentia - [power , might, ability; efficacy, potency]


	33. The Weeds of The Soul

"papa love your princess  
so that she will find loving princes familiar  
papa cry for your princess  
so that she will find gentle princes familiar..."  
  
\-- Princes Familiar, Alanis Morissette  
  
  
Amanda Morrow was scrutinizing her with blue, dove-like eyes. The healer, Hermione thought, had something avian about her looks, from the way she tilted her head, to the sharp tip of her small nose and her claw-like fingers, closing around her wand. They were seated in the Healer's small session room in an independent section of the ward - Amanda rested comfortably on a low sofa, facing Hermione - who always chose to sit on the opposite armchair.  
  
The elder woman nodded. "If there is anything in particular you want to discuss with me today, please concentrate on that and let your body relax."  
  
Hermione could sometimes swear she was able to virtually feel Amanda's gaze following the moulding of her body onto the dents and depressions of the armchair.  
  
"Good," she heard Amanda's voice echoing around her. "Now close your eyes - I'll count to three - One two three… _Legilimens!_ "  
  
Right in front of her eyes, at a level of existence enabled by Legilimency - both in memory and the side-by-side presence of Healer Morrow's mind - was her five-year-old self. She had been seated at the dinner table in her parents' house, staring idly at a strange dish. Watching the scene from her seemingly secure position in Dr Morrow's session room, Hermione was able to recognize the dish as sushi- it was a particular time in the eighties when everyone lusted after Japanese food, and Donna, too, felt obliged to feed her husband and daughter raw fishes and seaweeds.  
  
Disgusted, five-year-old Hermione reached her hand to give the strange dish a closer examination. She had no intention of putting the slippery, pinkish salmon into her mouth, and so was disassembling the sushi roll, looking inside for something half palatable.  
  
"Hermione Jane!" Donna's voice rang in her ears, causing her to drop the raw fish at once.  
  
Blushing, she stared shamefully at her plate, knowing she had been caught playing with her food.  
  
Donna, a flicker of pink tongue licking invisible moisture off her lipstick-painted mouth, sighed in desperation. "Go on, go wash your hands, and don't forget the soap. That fishiness won't just come off with plain water. We're waiting."  
  
Lester, from the corner of the table, gave her a small wink, as if telling her to never mind her mother's capricious whims. The teenaged girl recumbent in the armchair stiffened at this gesture. Her lower lip trembled and the memory altered, replaced by another memory where a twelve-year-old or so Hermione was bent over a marble sink, using the antiseptic she sneaked from her parents' clinic to wash her arms. Tchaikovsky was playing in the background, the violins strumming on her nerves, and she found herself working the antiseptic into her skin in rhythm with the music.  
  
She felt herself flicker to another memory of hand-washing ג€" one where her breasts were already pricking the cloth of her shirt - she brought her fingers to her nose. Sniffing closely, she searched for the somewhat salty scent of bertholine, angry that she could still detect it. Several years before, Donna told her that masturbation was normal and legitimate, and yet the scent of it would never come off her hands, and it seemed Hermione would never be aroused by simple, normal things. In some parallel film of memory, she could see herself attempting to fantasize about kissing Ron or Harry, having sex with them, trying to imagine what fourteen-year-old Ron's penis looked like. And yet, when she lay in her bed at night, reaching under the covers to pleasure herself, she would usually see a faceless figure in a Slytherin Quidditch uniform, isolating her behind the Quidditch changing rooms and raping her with her face against the wall. The wall smelled of bertholine.  
  
Panting, Hermione clutched the armrests of the armchair, blinking as the swirling loop of memories suddenly stopped and Amanda Morrow's face wavered into her cognition.  
  
"Why did you stop now - ?" she breathed. "We didn't even reach any of the cognitive inter-layers - the deeper memories"  
  
The healer shook her head. "You were upset. Perhaps today is not a good time to reach those places."  
  
Frustration pushed her back into the armchair. "Isn't Illumination supposed to upset one?"  
  
"Upset, yes, but not to undermine," Amanda answered. "My purpose is to heal, not to cause more damage."  
  
Hermione clenched her teeth. "I don't see why this particular set of memories would stimulate such a reaction. They're not even important."  
  
"This, perhaps, is something we can discuss here."  
  
"I thought Illumination had to do with spiritual interference?"  
  
"Many things affect the human spirit, working to give our soul its current shape," said Amanda. "Illumination is a shortcut- reaching your soul via magic and banishing the shadows. It only simulates the process that happens in real life, when you reach into those places yourself through talking and understanding the issues involved. It is important that we talk about them, though, or else the Illumination was wasted. Is it clearer for you now?" she asked.  
  
Hermione nodded tiredly. "Yes, yes. It simply - I feel as if we're moving in circles - and I'm exhausted, I -" she bit on her lower lip. "So my father touched me inappropriately, I suffer an OCD, ran away with my Potions professor who could have been my father and have rather twisted sexual fantasies. Good for me."  
  
"Yes," the healer answered quietly, watching her with those big, sizzling eyes, "but is it really good for you?" and with that, she told Hermione their time for today was over. "I want to see you again three days from now. But please give it some thought."  
  
Glaring at the healer, she stood up, dusting some invisible dirt off her trousers. Amanda's office was kept in relative order, wasn't particularly keen in her cleansing charm. Even the house elves, scrubbing the place once a week, couldn't stand up to Hermione Granger's standards.  
  
Noting the nervous manner in which her patient was rubbing her hands against each other, Amanda's brow furrowed in concentration. "And Hermione-" she added.  
  
The girl raised her head to look at the healer.  
  
"Your hands are clean. Your clothes are clean," she said gently, then her voice hardened. "Remember that one of the reasons we're here is to prevent you from causing damage to yourself. Scraping yourself would result in certain restrictions of your freedoms. Am I clear on that subject?"  
  
Hermione tightened her lips, but nonetheless, gave the healer a brief nod of understanding.  
  
Chloe, engaged in E. A Poe's collected works, lifted her gaze to look at her cranky friend entering their room. Noting the thin air of distress sizzling around Hermione like raw magic, she had carefully bookmarked the page she was currently reading, then set the book aside. Poignant-blue eyes anchored Hermione in place: Chloe did not smile ג€" not a literal smile which could have been bookmarked the way Poe's collection had just been. But her eyes held a certain warmth, as well as a certain sharpness. Chloe Nott had never received the social training that might show her how to keep her metaphorical razor hidden. Nevertheless, Hermione assumed, razors were something she knew how to deal with. She was learning how to deal with Chloe Nott, as well.  
  
"So?" the curly-headed girl asked. "How was today's session?"  
  
Hermione dropped on the bed, quickly kicking away her shoes and stretching her limbs. "Nothing new. No excitement but the usual creepy one, if you'd call it excitement. We began Legilimency, then Amanda stopped the current, claiming I was upset. We talked for a while, reached no new conclusions-"  
  
Chloe lifted her eyebrow. "What conclusions do you expect?"  
  
"I don't know-!" Hermione answered exhaustedly, eyes wandering over the ceiling. "I suppose I'd like to know the reasons for my behaviour - to have a clear narrative according to which I may be able to explain myself-"  
  
"Sounds somewhat like a scientific curiosity to me," Chloe interrupted.  
  
"Well, isn't that what Illumination is all about? Attempting to dissect the wizarding spirit in scientific methods?"  
  
"I believe-" the other girl began thoughtfully, "that salvation shall come from within."  
  
"Don't give me this bullshit."  
  
"Oh, but it isn't." A nasty gleam shone in Chloe's eyes, then died as she shook her eyes, attempting a serious expression. "You see- Illumination uses scientific methods to put you into order. That is fine. Let Amanda walk you through the valley of the shadow of death, dear old Chloe will watch over you. But then, my love, when you're on the other side, illuminated and scientifically disinfected, there will still be the sterile, now neatly-ordered cage of your soul you'll have to live in. So, you see, Amanda may feed you with her wand-waving. There are certain things, though, only you can obtain. And maintain."  
  
Hermione rolled onto her stomach, scrutinizing Chloe. _How much_ , she had often wondered, _do you learn about humanity from inspecting and dissecting those twisted specimens you are presented with? Am I only one of the negatives you observe in your darkroom: do you spread my picture flat against the wall and replace white with black and vice versa, to imagine how normal people must be? And do you enjoy me as much as I do you - ?_  
  
As if sensing Hermione's thoughts, the girl on the other bed was slowly rising to her feet. She smiled at Hermione, unapologetically shaking the four poster bed as she jumped on it. Long limbed, lazy creature that she was, Chloe stretched beside Hermione, the faceless sun from the magically-shielded window glittering in her always dancing hair. There was a silence between them, not her and Ron's faded-cotton silence, but another, whispery silence: a spider-web, silky silence made of golden sunshine and the low ruffle of pages, turned in a book. When Chloe's side touched her own on the narrow bed, there was no recoiling- only a small internal shrink that came and faded. Then the silence was back, humming between them like electricity flowing from two highly charged items, and Hermione giggled- a stupid, childish, girlish giggle.

  
  
* * *

April soon shifted into May, more fake sun was pouring out of the bewitched windows, and as much she doubted it - trying her new stability like a newfound magical item - the fractures were slowly mending. Together with Amanda, she had been reaching for the dusty storeroom of her mind: she liked to think of it as the locked cupboards of her memories, washing them with clear, acidic light, and once again making them reachable. Making herself reachable. There were often points when she lost her famous self-control: she would break into tears, or be clawed by a fit of anger. On those occasions, Amanda was always there, consoling, appeasing, offering words of comfort. Chloe, too, had watched her progress silently. Being pessimistic by nature, her friend would rather quote Ecclesiastes then sweet-talk her, but the knowledge of Chloe - the knowledge of Chloe's being hers - was rare and beautiful. It was enough to be a comfort.  
  
Her days were not spent idly. As devoted to her studies as ever, she prepared for her NEWTs, spending the rest of her time training and enjoying Chloe's company. She had never been someone who enjoyed mingling, and so remained estranged from the rest of the youths staying in the ward. Paradoxical as it seemed, she sometimes thought her time on the ward was her calmest ever.  
  
Now that the Fidelius Charm had been undone, there were certain issues that had to be dealt with First was having her things sent from Hogwarts, a task that Harry insisted he would manage. Hermione simply ignored the letter sent to her from the Headmaster. Next and more important were her parents- who, immediately upon being notified concerning their daughter's whereabouts, demanded to get her into their custody. This was impossible, due to her mental state. At that, they demanded to visit her. Which she refused. Amanda had quietly disapproved. Privately, Hermione suspected that her continued difficulties were partially due to her refusal to talk to her parents. But this newfound pretense of serenity was bliss, and she could not risk it. It was all, in a sense, a lie. She would never be whole. Why should she, then, exchange the sedating lie with the suffocating truth?  
  
"Because such pretenses don't last," was Amanda's answer when they sat one day in her office. "They only help you for a little while before you break all over again. You should learn to live with your abyss. Learn how to walk around it, build bridges over it. The hard way. Not fool yourself into thinking you can fly over it. Because you can't, and you're bound to fall."  
  
She clenched her jaw, avoiding the elder woman's unequivocal gaze. Her thin, merciful lips, which would demand answers. "This is unfair," Hermione said at last. "Yes, I know I sound foolish, but the more I'm thinking about it, that is what I come up with. Certain people- they're just born to loving, normal parents, being brought up having a normal, secure childhood, grow up and have normal sex with normal partners. No shadows, no nightmares, no cupboards."  
  
Amanda narrowed her eyes. "What are you telling me?"  
  
"That I am envious! That I see those people blissfully happy in their ignorance and I want to - "she breathed deeply. "I'm not sure whether I want to pain them so they'd know how I feel or I whether I want them to look at me in my suffering- you know, when I was a small girl I believed that some sort of machine should be invented, to insert this sense of - internal loneliness, and loss, and pain into everyone: I believed this would be the way to prevent people from hurting others, by forcing them to experience empathy." Hermione shook her head. "Nowadays I'm just - martyring myself in my suffering, in my exhibitionism - I have so much pain in me. Perhaps I need people to see it so I won't be alone. Perhaps I need them to unburden me. Perhaps if I'm looked into hard enough I'm no longer myself and I'm finally clean. I don't know... I don't know."  
  
"'Clean' is a meaningful term in this room, between us," the healer noted. "Can you tell me some more about being 'cleaned' by the people looking at you?"  
  
Hermione sighed, sinking deeper into the chair. "This is exhausting."  
  
"I never promised it to be anything but exhausting," Amanda said gently.  
  
"Well - " Hermione picked invisible lint from her sleeve, frowning a little. "You know, this image reminds me of some earlier fantasy I used to have - " she blushed a little, then continued. "About being presented in a supermarket, as part of the merchandise - " her frown deepened. "Can you tell I'm demonstrating some exhibitionistic tendencies right now? Oh, nevermind. So it was - me, naked, in a corner of the supermarket, on a... well, a seat, much like a dentist's seat, in fact ג€" how Freudian, don't you think? ג€" and the customers would come and go, fucking me for some small price."  
  
All along, the healer's steady gaze did not leave her eyes. "Go on."  
  
Blushing furiously now, Hermione continued. "Well- it was a very exhibitionistic fantasy, don't you think? Only the point, there, was to be dirtied, polluted, contaminated. Though, post-factum, I'm not so sure. It was - everything was - very sterile, you see. And I was… permitted. To everybody. I was breached, and then I was also - I am not quite sure how to put it, perhaps I'm just babbling. I think that perhaps, if I put myself there right now, this situation allows me to forget. Your body becomes nothing and your soul flies away - God, I am babbling." She worried her lower lip, wishing, for some reason, that bursting into tears would be as easy as fantasizing about being polluted. "Sometimes I want to be no more. I think - I think they should have my body, and they could do anything they want with it - it deserves it. It deserves to be abused. It deserved to be stared at. I deserved to be stared at. Then I'd be clean."  
  
Amanda only nodded, and bending forward, offered Hermione a tissue with which to wipe her tears. She took it, gratefully letting the moisture shining on her skin dampen the soft, linen-like paper. Suddenly it occurred to Hermione how out of place were the Muggle tissues in the Wizarding hospital, and how fitfully it folded into her fisted palm. Strange- the things one thought about when distressed. But then, it seemed to be a moment for anachronisms. An age. With that in mind, she trotted out of the office, met by Jervy's empty gaze when she entered her room.  
  
The boy's head was resting in Chloe's lap, and the other girl was stroking his hair absentmindedly as she read through some Transfiguration text.  
  
"You cried," she noted, lifting her eyes from the book.  
  
"C..cried," Jervy didn't fail to echo.  
  
Hermione sank on her bed, kicking away her shoes. "Your little pest is drooling."  
  
A startled look crossed Chloe's face before her features were locked behind a black expression. "You watch your language when you relate to Jervy, is that clear?"  
  
"Yeah, right." Turning her back to them, she buried her face in her pillow, wishing for a key to solve her own anachronisms. Perhaps, she sometimes thought, she was looking in vain. Perhaps there was no resolution to her whispery, eerie sea of whirling shadows. The way nothing could fill the black holes that were Jervy's eyes.  
  
Luckily enough, Chloe was quick to forgive the way she was easy to irritate. That night, they sat in their usual composition, Chloe at the magically shielded window and Hermione on her bed, attempting to seal whatever fractures that had been caused to each of them during the day.  
  
"It is not Jervy's fault, you know," Chloe said quietly. "He didn't choose to become what he is."  
  
"I know, I'm sorry."  
  
"None of us did."  
  
"So quickly retreating to the safe realms of cliché?" she teased Chloe tiredly.  
  
"So quickly retreating to the safe realms of cynicism?" But the blue-eyed girl shook her head. "They always tell you life is a gift. That you should treasure it. What utter crap." The bluish circles under Chloe's eyes were two crescents of exhaustion. "Life is not a gift," she continued. "Life is a burden. We were simply _made_. Given birth to without ever being asked permission, whether we are interested or even capable of dealing with the difficulties we've been presented with. I used to wonder at my circumstances many times, wondering why I should be born the way I am, practically incapable of ever leaving this ward, and realized that life just - _is_." The moonlight emphasized the sharp, lovely lines of Chloe's profile, playing in the vivacious crown of her curls. She breathed deeply, preparing to speak again. "That is it, in fact. I am a seriously fucked up individual, and I am aware of it. This is the life I have to live. So I either live it or not."  
  
Hermione moistened her mouth- sharp, metal teeth stabbing into the soft tissue of her larynx, causing her to gasp with pain. "You are - not, you know. You are - "  
  
The brown haired girl gave her a crooked smile. "You are lovely, too. When you finally shut your mouth. Now go to sleep. I want to watch the street as long as it's dark and I'm allowed to remove the magical concealments."  
  
  


* * *

  
  
Sneaking from school on a Hogsmeade weekend, Harry used the opportunity to come and visit her once again. Doing his best to ignore the stares, he gladly followed Hermione into the room she shared with Chloe, relieved to be out of the center of attention. In what Hermione finally discerned was his usual manner, Harry sank beside her on the bed, curling beside her like a lost puppy. It never occurred to her before, and slightly embarrassed by her lack of observation, she laced her fingers through Harry's messy hair, providing him with the warmth and the simple human touch he so desperately craved.  
  
Chloe, who had been out of the room at the time, appeared at the door followed by Jervy. Seeing the two together, she disappeared unnoticed; her mouth twitching as she realized Jervy had remembered Harry.  
  
Inside the room, Harry and Hermione sat quietly for a while. "You are - softer," he said at last. "Easier. Though I'm not sure. Perhaps it's just me, missing you more."  
  
She nodded. "No, no - I think you're right - You know, I sometimes wonder, how everything you had been through would make you - so giddy. Did you know you're giddy? While I- I am so withdrawn and harsh-"  
  
"Not anymore," he cut across her, looking at her behind the thick lenses of his spectacles. "Not like before."  
  
She bit on her lower lip. "But I'm not even sure if it's good, Harry! I - sometimes it feels like I'm crumbling - all my walls, my defenses- they are no longer functioning, I cry at every foolish thing. I am unsafe, unprotected - I-" she bit her lower lip to stop its trembling, "I miss him so much. It's like a having a gaping hole in the middle of my body. I can't breathe for missing him."  
  
"I would've told you everything is going to be all right, but-" Harry frowned.  
  
She nodded. "I know. It won't." She closed her eyes. "It would be - different."  
  
"Do you believe there's only one person for us?"  
  
"You know I find these Muggle mysticisms to be utter crap."  
  
"Wizards believe in soul mates." He gave her a quizzical look.  
  
"Wizards believe that blood purity is an indicator of magical capability."  
  
Harry gave a low sigh. "You're probably right."  
  
"Anyhow -" she touched her index finger to her abused lower lip. "People grow old - they change with time - the person who seemed to be the love of our life at seventeen my not be the one for us at twenty - "  
  
"I don't think I'll ever stop loving Draco."  
  
"That's a bit - " she had carefully looked for an adjective, "unequivocal. Rash. You're only seventeen. You might change your mind in due time, don't you think?"  
  
"Yes, yes, it is. But I realize that - well, in a sense, that's how I am. That's how you are, too. We know our minds- and we're steady, you see? What we need, it doesn't change. Our hearts don't change. We are stupid, sentimental Gryffindors, and we're steady at that."  
  
She swallowed past the soreness in her throat. "You mean steady as in: doomed to love one person for the rest of eternity?"  
  
"Now that's Muggle mysticism," Harry told her. "I just want to be off with Draco- go away when all of this is over, to a place where nobody recognizes us, where there's no prejudice and no Harry Potter. Just me and him, and perhaps a piece of shore - " his eyelids closed, and he snuggled closer, pressing his head into her bosom. "I'd really like to do that."  
  
"It sounds lovely," she said at last. "Perhaps once the war is over - "  
  
"Yeah." He reached to remove his glasses, allowing Hermione to take them and put them on the night table. "Do you have any plans for the future?"  
  
"Me?"  
  
"Don't you ever think of what you'd like to do once we're done with this mess?"  
  
She let her head drop backward, blinking through shreds of images misleading her like pixies towards wavering visions of possible futures. "I've been - so distracted lately that I hardly had - the inclination of making future plans."  
  
"And when I ask you now?"  
  
She blinked. "I - well." Words came with difficulty, and she was astounded to realize the university education she had once longed for had suddenly seemed so dull. Faced with this new reality, adapting her expectations all at once, she felt pulled and worn beyond her measures, striped with stretch marks; ugly and used. "I - just me, and him. To do some study, I suppose. Maybe do some traveling. Do some research. Nothing fancy."  
  
"I'd like that, for you." Harry gave her a little smile, angelic contentment pouring over his doll-like features as she stroked his hair. "By the way - about - him," he went on, clearing his throat nervously.  
  
"What about him?" she asked, tensing at once.  
  
"We met him, a while ago, at the Circle." Harry swallowed loudly. "He sent me a letter, through Professor MacGonagall, telling me about how the Stones work. Then we went there- me, Ron and Draco. I summoned the Needfire. I was stronger than before."  
  
Hermione nodded, considering his words quietly. _Sweet Harry, you do not wish to pain me and how carefully you navigate the blade inside the open flesh, so gently your touch is almost clinical. Sometimes I almost wish for a sharp blow._ "How - how did he look?" she asked after several moments of silence.  
  
Harry's brow wrinkled with a deep, somewhat childish frown. "Well- he is - him. You know," he told her, appearing somewhat relieved when Hermione answered with a crooked smile. "But then - he's - pale. And he looks - maybe thinner. Though you can hardly tell with those robes." Harry's lips twitched. "I think he misses you."  
  
"I wish someone would take care of him." She didn't mean it to be so, but the tears soaked through the thin cracks in her voice, making it quiver.  
  
"I'll try. But he's not at Hogwarts much."  
  
"You're sweet. I'm just trying to imagine you attempting to take care of Snape."  
  
"That should horrify you," Harry made his input, "not make you laugh."  
  
"You're probably right."  
  
He shrugged. "Things will be all right. They have to be all right. I'm sick of everything being wrong with my life."  
  
She rolled her eyes. "So saying it will be all right will make everything okay?"  
  
"No. I would."  
  
"Really?"  
  
He rolled on his back, looking at her. "I've been doing some thinking lately."  
  
"Did you?"  
  
"Yeah." Harry nodded. "And I came to a conclusion- about my role in the war, and everything. I've been thinking of myself as a victim for quite a while. A pawn, someone who had been trained to do the dirty jobs. But you know, I think I'm okay with it. Not as if I like it or think it's right, because I don't. But I'm stuck with this role of ending Voldemort, and I'll do it. Not only because that's what everyone expects me to do or because there's no one else to do it- but because I'm fucking sick of him dictating my life. I want this over. I want out. And I'm tired of being a victim. So I'm not. You see, it's that simple."  
  


* * *

  
The weather was warming gradually. Even the enchanted sunrays, as Chloe used to mention bitterly, had warmed up. It was a week or so after Harry's visit that she found herself seated in Amanda's office, straying to the large window-seat in order to absorb some of the magical sun. Light poured on her face and memories seemed to pour from her mind as she sat there, wondering at this new ease in which she had been disassembled. Reduced to tears.  
  
"Do you wish to tell me about it?" Amanda probed gently.  
  
Another seemingly random string of memories floated onto the surface of her perception this session, and she had been shivering as the Healer scanned them, dissected them, and put them back into place.  
  
"What can I tell you about it?" she asked in a hollow voice.  
  
"Tell me about the faceless boy in the Slytherin Quidditch uniform you met behind the broom shed."  
  
"He's no one."  
  
The older woman gave her a quizzical look.  
  
"He's everyone."  
  
"Snape, too?"  
  
"Especially Snape."  
  
"And Harry?"  
  
Hermione shook her head. "No. Not Harry."  
  
"Your father?"  
  
"I suppose so."  
  
"Why not Harry, then?" Amanda bright eyes narrowed, as if she was trying to capture an idea, an archetype, within their clear, glowing depths.  
  
She released a loud sigh. "Because Harry is - sweet. Delicate. Hurt. Harry is - _clean_."  
  
"But your father is a dentist," the healer rebutted. "A Muggle doctor. He works with disinfectants and sterilizers. Do you suggest he is unclean?"  
  
She shook her head, images flooding her mind. Lester, reaching for her as they sat together on the sofa, listening to his music or watching her television programs, his hands wandering along her childish body; warm and smelling of shower and sleep when she crawled into her parents' bed on holidays and Sundays - milky skin, mustache, bright, wavering eyes - "Sweaty- his palms - were sometimes sweaty." She bit on her lower lip. "It's not him, damn it. It's me, me. Me, being dirty, after he touched me - It's just felt - wrong, so fucking wrong. I was sitting on the porch one afternoon, eating biscuits - Donna sent me outside so I wouldn't dirty her sofas, and he came, sitting there beside me-" a heavy lump settled in her throat and she reached her hand to massage it, as if attempting to swallow it down. "Chocolate biscuits, still warm from the bakery. She hardly ever brought me sweets. Not good for the teeth, you see. So I was sent away, to fumble with the biscuits while she was planning her last dinner party. He joined me on the porch - I'd prefer we didn't talk about it."  
  
Amanda watched her quietly for a while, saying nothing. She didn't urge. She didn't push. Her eyes and her eyes alone moved about the room, casting about in small, measured movements, groping and calculating angles and miens. At last, weakened by the healer's steady scrutiny, Hermione resumed her restrained speech.  
  
"I was nibbling on my biscuits. He was - touching me. There were crumbs. On my shirt. On my cutoffs. On my fingers. He would lick them off my fingers. I despised that, but said nothing. I liked - his touching. I hated - " she inhaled deeply, "I hated liking to be touched that way. It seemed - wrong. Then I brushed the crumbs off my shirt and went to the sink, to wash his saliva off my hands. To wash my - hands." She frowned, wiping away a stray tear, which somehow escaped the confinement of her left eye. "Then later - I'd take a shower or scrape my hands, and everything would be all right again. Clean. Sterile. Balanced. _White_. Did you know white is the lack of colour?" Hermione sniffed. "I wanted a white house with a white bathroom and a white bed with white sheets and no one, ever, to share it with me."  
  
Amanda nodded, handing her a white tissue.  
  
She blew her nose. "This isn't helping!"  
  
"I didn't say it would help immediately," the other woman said quietly.  
  
"I feel so -" Hermione swooned in her place angrily, looking for the right word. "Contaminated. You tear me apart, then you rummage through the shreds, replacing them, rearranging me- have you ever though the exposure might be deadly??"  
  
"Yes," answered Amanda. "The exposure is meant to kill those weeds growing wild in your soul, preventing you from growing tall and strong and assured."  
  
"It hurts!" she cried, burying her face in her hands. "You hurt me."  
  
The healer exhaled sadly. "Yes, I'm afraid I do, child. I'm afraid I have to. But no more than you hurt yourself."


	34. Empty Vessels

  
_beautifully wandering in merciful  
miracles wonderingly celebrate day  
and welcome earth's arrival with a soul...  
  
\-- from"might these be thrushes climbing through almost "  
  
\-- e.e.cummings_  
  
  
  
The sun was setting in a bloody and glorious sky when Snape and Lucius arrived from nowhere at the front gates of Hogwarts castle. Snape staggered as the ground came up beneath him. It seemed he had lost control of his muscles, somehow. He had lost coordination and grace.  
  
His magic was gone.  
  
He could feel that it was gone. Always before in his life there had been a sense of confidence; of capability, of strength of will. Now...now, he felt as though he needed to be told what to do next, which foot to put in front of the other, when to blink, where to look. How to think. _What_ to think.  
  
He went to his knees, even with Lucius' hand on his arm dragging him upright.  
  
"Please kill me, Lucius," he whispered. "I can't live like this."  
  
Lucius gave a hard yank to Snape's arm and pivoted to sneer down at him, gripping Snape's sharp chin in his hand. Snape could feel the coldness of the signet ring against his neck. "As if I'd kill you now, you idiot, when the bastard did just what I wanted him to do. The _whole fucking point_ was for you to stay alive. The only better outcome would have been that spell backfiring on Voldemort, but since it didn't, I'll just have to be satisfied enough."  
  
"He has my magic," Snape moaned.  
  
"And you have your _life_. That counts for something, don't you think?" His booted foot swung at Snape's thigh. "Get up. No more self-pity, you miserable, sniveling worm! You disgrace the name of Slytherin."  
  
"I'm no better than a Muggle. Salazar would be ashamed."  
  
"Get up. I'm taking you to Dumbledore."  
  
"There's no point..."  
  
"There's every point. Do you think that just because your wand is broken that you cannot be of use? Get up, Snape! Teach my son what he needs to know in the days to come. Keep him safe. I cannot be here and you know it. And I won't take Draco out of here...it's the safest place for him until the Dark Lord decides to show his cards. I'll come for Draco when it's time."  
  
Snape struggled to his feet. He stumbled in Lucius' wake as the blond led him toward the front doors, and then down the stone hallways to Dumbledore's office; it surprised him somewhat that Lucius was so familiar with the route, never hesitating.  
  
"Open up, old man!" Lucius called, rapping sharply on the doorframe of the office. Snape, feeling like he could not even hold himself upright, slumped against the wall for support.  
  
The door opened, but there was not the usual friendly voice bidding entry. Instead, Dumbledore stood just inside the opened door, his wand at the ready. His eyes glittered, but not with their familiar blue twinkle. No, this was a cold look; a look very like the one Snape had seen the night he was sacked. "What brings you here, Mr Malfoy?"  
  
"I've brought you your spy. Voldemort has no further use for him." Lucius took Snape by the arm and shoved him towards Dumbledore. "He performed the _Transfundo potentia_ on Snape."  
  
Dumbledore's quickly indrawn breath told Snape all he needed to know. "That is a powerful spell," said the headmaster.  
  
"He's a powerful wizard," Lucius confirmed. "I've done as he asked. Brought you this empty vessel. You owe him a safe harbour, Dumbledore." The blond held out the broken pieces of Snape's wand; when Dumbledore did not take them, he let them fall to the floor. Lucius spun on his heel and strode away, heels clicking on the stone. Snape watched him go, and when he was out of sight, Snape turned to Dumbledore.  
  
The bearded wizard looked deep into Snape's eyes for a long, long moment. "Yes," he said, slowly. "It's gone, I can see that. I've only seen this once before."  
  
"Flamel," said Snape, lifelessly.  
  
"Indeed. He took the magic from Grindelwald's second in command, during that War. It's part of what allowed us to defeat Grindelwald in the end. I dislike much the idea that Voldemort has absorbed your strength, Severus. Come, let me take you to Poppy."  
  
"There's nothing Poppy can do," said Snape. He resisted the arm that came around his shoulder to lead him to the infirmary. "What I want most..."  
  
"What is that?"  
  
"To die. Help me die, Albus. There's nothing inside me any longer. I...I don't want to live like this."  
  
Dumbledore laughed in his face. Laughed. "My dear boy, I would no more do that than I would kill Minerva or Flitwick or Hagrid. You may not be the most welcome sight I've had, but I certainly won't be killing you tonight."  
  
Snape lunged into Dumbledore's office, looking feverishly for Godric Gryffindor's sword. It was not in its usual place, hanging above Fawke's perch. Snape spun to stare at Dumbledore, who was following slowly. "Where is it?"  
  
"The sword? Not here, apparently. You know as well as I do, that sword goes where it will. And I wouldn't have allowed you to use it, anyway. Not to kill yourself. You'll have to do that without help from me. Come with me, Severus."  
  


~*~

  
  
Word quickly got out that the hated, virtually criminal Potions master was back at Hogwarts, living in the infirmary under the watchful eye of Madame Pomfrey and a series of spells to keep him restricted to the hospital ward. It wasn't long before Snape had visitors; merely a matter of hours. Poppy had turned back several of his more adventurous Slytherins. He would not allow Poppy to examine him. He knew what was wrong with him. His magic was gone, subsumed by the evil serpent wizard. Poppy's ministrations -- likely drawn from potions he had brewed for her himself -- would be of no use. Poppy glared at him as he sat almost smugly in his recalcitrance, and slammed the door behind her. He heard wards clicking into place and knew himself to be a prisoner.  
  
Minerva arrived fairly promptly. It seemed that wards of any kind hardly delayed her -- even his own, on New Year's Eve -- since she waltzed right in. He could hear Poppy protesting in the outer room. She went directly to where he sat in an armchair that overlooked the lake. He had been staring out at the faint ripples created by the Squid in the moonlight, thinking of nothing except his own desperation and pain. " _Lumos_ ," she said, to brighten the room. Minerva put both hands on his cheeks and turned his face into the light. She looked deep into his eyes. "Is it true, what Albus tells me? Vo-- _He's_ taken your magic?" Unshed tears glittered and swelled, but did not fall from her eyes.  
  
"It's true."  
  
Her voice was hushed when next she spoke. "Albus says it's irreversible." She shook her head. "Oh, Severus. I could never have imagined or wished for this, not even after New Year's. How did it happen? What set him off? Did he discover what we did at the Circle?"  
  
Snape nodded tiredly. "In a way. He knows I had something to do with warding Potter and Malfoy. He was infuriated. He summoned Lucius; he wanted him there, to have him kill me. Lucius suggested the _Transfundo potentia_. He deliberately flattered Voldemort into trying the spell. I wish he had killed me instead."  
  
Minerva gasped. "You don't, either! Lucius saved your life, though I don't understand why! You have everything to live for, you --"  
  
Snape struck her hands away from him. "You don't know what this is like, Minerva," he hissed. "Don't give me platitudes. Spare me your pity, unless you've got a knife hidden in your robes."  
  
"I know I'd far rather lose my magic than my life," she spat. "Ungrateful bastard that you are! How many others have had no choice in the matter?"  
  
"That's 'vile Slytherin bastard' to you, Minerva. And I had no choice. Lucius took it away from me."  
  
At that moment, Flitwick burst into the room. His small hands were filled with swizzle sticks of all sorts. "They tell me your wand has been broken by -- by He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named," he gabbled, and motioned a small table toward Snape's armchair. He spilled the sparkling array of sticks onto its polished surface and began picking through them. "One of these _might_ work until we can get you to Ollivander's...we don't want you completely defenseless..." But a moment or two later he sensed the tension and looked up at the two of them.  
  
"Filius," said Snape. "Have you not heard the story of my dismissal?"  
  
Flitwick looked from Snape to Minerva and back. "Well, yes."  
  
"And now -- what have you heard this evening?"  
  
" _He_ broke your wand..."  
  
"And what do you think of me, knowing these things?"  
  
"Do you think I've been unaware of your spying?"  
  
Snape and Minerva both gaped at him.  
  
"Everyone thinks I'm oblivious -- happy little Flitwick, charming his way through life. Isn't he sweet, isn't he cute. Isn't he _small_. Beneath notice." His eyes glinted. "So much is said around you when you're harmless. I saw Miss Granger's hands. I wondered why she no longer came for extra practice in Charms. I saw much, and said nothing -- for which negligence I will probably burn in hell; but I thought she was improving under your care, Snape. And then I saw her decline when you were dismissed. I drew my own conclusions." He nudged two of the sticks toward Snape. "Try these. They are most like your wand -- no core, you understand, but if we can get even a flicker from them --"  
  
"His magic is gone," whispered Minerva.  
  
"There's no need to whisper," muttered Snape. "It's a fact of my _life_ now," he said bitterly, glaring at Minerva, who scowled back.  
  
"Gone? Surely not. Something must be left." Flitwick stared in disbelief.  
  
"There is nothing," said Snape. "You don't know -- I am...hollow. Never in my life has there been this emptiness, this desperation." He shook his head in disgust. "I don't even know why I'm telling you both this. Leave me, go away."  
  
Flitwick drew himself up. "You won't even try."  
  
"No. I was there, Filius. I know what happened, I saw Voldemort's wand consume my magic when he summoned it from me."  
  
Flitwick sniffed. "I thought you were a _scientist_ , first and foremost, and a wizard second. But I see you are only a _hack_." His lip curled, an expression copied from Snape himself.  
  
Snape's eyes widened and his nostrils flared in sudden fury. "How _dare_ you, little man!" He snatched at the swizzle closest to him and aimed it directly between Flitwick's eyes and hissed, " _Furnunculus_!" Flitwick flinched, but nothing happened. His face did not bloom with boils. The Charms professor bounced on the balls of his feet, nodding enthusiastically, blinking rapidly. Snape hurled the highly polished swizzle from himself and was pleased when it skittered far under the bed.  
  
"Indeed, your magic has gone. There was _intent_ behind that hex; I pushed you hard. Even without a wand, I should by rights be covered in pustules." His fingers began to drum on his lips. "Hmm...let me see...what else...perhaps we should see if you can still brew potions..."  
  
Despite himself, Snape began to chuckle derisively. "Do you know what I've been through today, you maniacal midget? Let me be. You can diagnose my lack of magic some other time, assuming I live long enough."  
  
Minerva suddenly burst into tears. "Stop it, stop it! I can't bear this!"  
  
Flitwick began to chuckle as well. "Where are the teacups to shatter when you need them?" He looked at Snape again. "You need food. I'll call the elves."  
  
"I'm not hungry."  
  
"A pity," said the Charms professor. "I don't recall asking you."  
  
  


~*~

  
  
It was a long time before Snape was finally left alone. He had eaten a cheese sandwich, a pear, four bars of Honeydukes' best bitter chocolate and drunk three cups of lemony tea before Flitwick was satisfied. The little man had never behaved so outrageously in Snape's memory; but then, Snape had never truly understood before that he had friends at Hogwarts. The thought made him uncomfortable, yet oddly soothed. He had long thought Minerva tolerated him, even cultivated a fondness for him, but to see her setting her anger with him aside to do what she could to help him...well, it turned his world view on edge. He was not alone in the world. And there was Lucius, for whom the _whole fucking point_ had been to keep him alive...Lucius, unpredictable as the weather, yet one always knew there _would be_ weather...  
  
" _Nox_ ," he said now, to extinguish the lights in the room, and flinched when they remained burning brightly. Habit died a hard death. He rose from the chair and moved about the room extinguishing them by hand, leaving only the one by his armchair. _Hermione, your lover is a Muggle now_ , he thought idiotically.  
  
The light in the room left him staring at his own reflection in the window, which was rendered a mirror by the darkness beyond the glass. He turned the armchair to face himself and stared into his own eyes, searching for any residual sign of magic. He had never seen his own magical ability, yet somehow he felt compelled to dwell upon his own image in a futile search for it.  
  
Dark eyes met dark eyes.  
  
 _Angharad: "Why is it so bad, to be your father's son?"  
  
Severus shuddered. They were walking at midnight, at the quarter waxing moon, in search of certain fungi that should grow in the hedgerows lining the lane to the village. "To know his spirit is within me...that I am the spawn of this violent, abusive man...it sickens me."  
  
"Yet you cannot change this. You can only rise above it. This is what it means to be human, Severus. It means you must strive to do better, to be more than what you are."  
  
"So many times, as a boy, I wanted to cut that out of myself...yet, Angharad, I let it take me over. I let that darkness drive me to Voldemort. I liked how it made me feel."  
  
"What you liked was the illusion of control." She halted and put her soft, gnarled hand on his arm. In the dimness he could see her streaky hair like a veil of clouds, welcome as summer rain, touching her shoulders. "Tell me why you finally left the Death Eaters, Severus. What changed for you?"  
  
Severus snorted. "I grew bored." How could he tell this peaceful, kind woman about the last potion Voldemort had required of him? The horrific stew that was to consist of the heated, lusting dreams of a young man, still virgin; a baby's last cry; and its mother's ferocious grief.  
  
"Why do you persist in lying to me, Severus? You know by now that I always recognize your falsehoods."  
  
His hands clenched. Through gritted teeth, he told her about Voldemort's youthful drink.  
  
"Tell me, Severus...whose mother did you think of? What babe?"  
  
"Of course I thought of my own self, my own mother, Angharad. What else would I think of?" And Lily, Lily, Lily. What might have been.  
  
"You abhorred what you were asked to do. Would your father have brewed such a drink?"  
  
Snape turned his head aside and spat the bitter taste in his mouth out into the hedgerow. "I'll not speak more of this, Angharad." And she had not pressed, but the conversation had never truly left him._  
  
And now it came rushing back. Dark eyes looked into dark eyes. _My father's eyes_. Just as his paleness came from his mother, his darkness came from his father. More than just his coloring. Yet -- were Angharad to see him now, would she look upon his actions favourably? What would she think of his choices?  
  
Seeking his soul through his druid rituals: a choice.  
  
Bringing Hermione into the Circle and teaching her druid ways: another choice.  
  
Making love with Hermione, even beyond that which certain rituals called for. Speaking his love to her. Taking her away with him. Sending her away, at last, to heal without him. Protecting Lucius and his son. Raising the Circle's benisons for others, and planning to use the glory of that Circle to end Voldemort once and for all, and the betrayal of Voldemort.  
  
All choices; _his_ choices.  
  
For good? For ill? He wanted to believe they were for good. The dark eyes he looked into were calmer than he remembered them; the steepled fingers he could see in the reflection were still; wandless, but still; even peaceful. The face was very thin; and even though he knew it was probably his imagination, he felt even thinner since Voldemort had taken his magic. He was less than he had been.  
  
And yet...the longer he stared, the more strongly he felt that something new was birthing, in this long, dark midnight. Something with a core of flame, of determination. Something that did not wish to be ended, something that longed for dawn. Could Conscience Minerva be right? Would he really rather lose his magic than his life?  
  
Something to think about, certainly. And he had a lot of time for that, didn't he? Days upon days.  
  


~*~

  
  
Wards hardly slowed Lily's boy, either. Only two days later Potter appeared, pushing his glasses nervously up his nose, and said, "I am going for a walk on the grounds. Perhaps you'd like to come along."  
  
"There are wards on my door," said Snape.  
  
"Not any longer," said Lily's boy matter-of-factly. "And Madame Pomfrey is busy at the Quidditch field. A Hufflepuff collided with the Slytherin Seeker."  
  
"Malfoy? And you're not there?" Snape's derisive gaze slid to the boy, who stood with his hands in his pockets, his hair pointing any number of ways, and his Lily-eyes looking coolly at him.  
  
"He's fine. I saw the whole thing. Not even a broom straw out of place." His hand fidgeted in his robe pocket, and something rustled there. "Professor, I made a promise to someone that I would..." He paused, and his dark brows drew together in a scowl that made the lightning-bolt scar stand out on his forehead. "...take care of you."  
  
Snape snorted. "I detect the fine hand of Miss Granger in this nonsense," he said.  
  
Potter ran his hands through his hair before shoving them back into his pockets. "It wasn't my first choice," he said now. "We shouldn't speak of this here, probably."  
  
"Why not? Have you more to tell me?"  
  
The green eyes flicked up and met his in silence.  
  
"I'll just get my robe," said Snape, who now suspected that the Slytherin Seeker had a part in this drama, to cause a distraction in the infirmary.  
  
Potter led him through little-used hallways until the two of them were exiting the obscure door that Snape and Hermione had used for their druid training sessions and rituals. It was clear that Potter was taking him to the Circle. As they walked, Snape plucked a few of the early oxeye daisies and yellow dandelion blossoms, and when they neared the Forbidden Forest, he ducked just inside its edge until he found a single black rose, the only one on its sprawling canes, and he plucked that too. _Hermione_ , he thought, inhaling its strange fragrance deeply.  
  
In all this time, Potter had said nothing. But when he saw the black rose, he blinked and spoke. "I'd always heard those were here, but I've never seen one before. Could I --?"  
  
Snape put it carefully into the boy's fingers. The black roses were very thorny.  
  
"It really is _black_ ," said Potter, wonderingly. "Aunt Petunia has a black rosebush, but it's really just a very dark red, with a sort of velvet finish on the petals." He kept hold of it, smelling it occasionally until they entered the Circle, at which point he placed it on the altar along with the wildflowers Snape had gathered.  
  
"Did you intend for us to try to call down the Needfire?" asked Snape. "Because I should warn you, it takes two -- male, and female."  
  
"I thought it would be helpful to you -- soothing, perhaps -- and it's a full moon tomorrow." The boy flushed and Snape found himself almost chuckling. "It doesn't really matter, does it, if the fire doesn't come? As long as the honor of the sun and moon is attended to."  
  
"Taking care of me?" Snape queried dryly. "Why don't you tell me what else you know of Miss Granger."  
  
Potter felt in his pocket, and withdrew a parchment roll, which he held out to Snape. "She sent you a letter. She tried to send it by owl, but it came back unopened."  
  
"Does she know about -- me?" Snape found himself asking. He couldn't bring himself to say more, but he desperately wanted to know if she'd been told he had lost his magic.  
  
"She got it out of me when I visited yesterday." Potter looked down at the flowers, and then said, "I think I'll just go and walk toward the Quidditch pitch. I'll be back in a while, all right?"  
  
Snape's trembling fingers stretched out to take the parchment. He knew Potter saw his weakness, but he was so eager for Hermione's words that he scarcely cared, and did not see the youth leave the Circle.  
  
" _Dear Snape,  
  
Healer Morrow says I will soon be well enough to return to school. In time for my NEWTs, and just in time for the War. How convenient. I can accomplish my NEWTs, then risk my beautiful, now mentally stable little self for the sake of the cause. Charming.  
  
The window here still cannot be opened, and likely never will be; Chloe, my roommate, has found a way to charm off the heavy glamour masking it, so that we can peer at the real world for a time; since she's doing it at night, the staff turns a blind eye to her experimenting with the spell. It is all we know of reality, it seems. Rain at night; fog at night; cars at night; disturbed pigeons flying at night. Very appropriate.  
  
I must keep this short; the owls here are very small and cannot be overloaded. It stops the families from sending useful things like warm jumpers and books of spells with which to fool the physicians.  
  
I find I still love you desperately. I am meticulous and steadfast in my obsessions. Tell me the time, Snape. Is it now? Is it ours? For I am nearly well. I long for the cottage, and Crookshanks, and you. I know you will not tell me the time, though.  
  
Regards,  
Hermione Granger  
  
p.s. -- Harry was here today. He told me about what happened. I cried, of course. How egotistic of me, but then I rebuked myself, and let Harry put me together with glue (if only to marry your self-made puppet later. I am becoming morbid, now aren't I? Did you read Plath, by the way?) I will be fine. You are fine. I suppose everyone else is fussing over your supposed tragedy, so I'll fuss over _me _instead. I shall tell you only this: I love you. I don't care whether or not you can do magic. Harry will bring this to you. Harry says he will care for you.  
H. G._  
  
Snape sat hard on the edge of the altar stone after reading her letter. He let the parchment curl back on itself, and slid the bit of string around it again. He tucked the letter into his pocket, and then he rose and began his ritual, without the dusk or the dawn, without his Druid clothing, without his flask, and without his sickle. Without preparation, or purification, and yet somehow it felt more appropriate than ever, more right. He needed these moments of peace; Potter had been right about that.  
  
He faced the west and blessed the sun. "Bel, sweet rest." Then he turned east, and welcomed the moon. "Ahrianrhod, welcome."  
  
He lifted the black rose from the altar. He lacked a sickle, but the black rose had thorns and would draw blood readily. A large thorn served his purpose well; he squeezed the pad of his thumb and watched the welling of red. A vision of Hermione, blood soaked and still, flashed through his mind, but he banished it. _No. I was right to involve her in this. I helped her. I did right._  
  
"East, into the bright Light." A single drop of blood into the flowers.  
  
"West, into the soft Night." Another drop.  
  
"South, into the warm Spark." A third.  
  
"North, into the chill Dark." And the last. Snape laid the black rose on the altar amidst the jumble of white and yellow blossoms.  
  
And then, more from habit than anything else, he lifted his head and called for the Needfire, expecting the old emptiness, the lack, that had been the norm before Hermione.  
  
Before love.  
  
Before forgiveness.  
  
Before the loss of his magic.  
  
Before this flame was birthed, this tiny glowing coal that lived next to the image of Hermione in the chamber of his heart.  
  
The cold tide that swept his ankles took him unawares. Snape's arms dropped in his bewilderment, and at that moment he saw Potter, approaching again from the northwest. Snape felt the vortex begin its whirling, and looking down, saw the Needfire dwelling coolly in the heap of petals and stems.  
  
Potter slowed as he neared the Stones, and pressed a tentative palm to the gap between two of the massive rocks. When he pulled back sharply, Snape knew he had called the Needfire and wakened his Circle. Alone, he had called it. And now he knew how Angharad had raised her own solitary Circle...hers had been a pure soul.  
  
Druid Snape fell to his knees next to the altar, and spoke aloud, aware that Lily's boy was watching and could hear, but it no longer mattered. He was shaken. He was elated.  
  
"Fill me," he said softly; joyfully. "I am unclean, unclothed, but I am prepared for a soul. I have a name for my soul," he said. "I call my soul Severus Snape." He bowed his head. He wanted to weep, but there was too much joy flooding him. _Angharad, you were right_ , he thought, and then he said it aloud: "Angharad, you were right. I have learned to tie my knots correctly, my mentor."


	35. The Glass House

"to all the unheard wisdom in the schoolyard  
you think you're the right ones  
you think you're the charmed ones I'm sure  
how can you go on with such conviction?  
and who do you think you are why do you question me?  
because we can't not  
because we can't not  
because we can't help laugh at underestimations..."  
  
\--Can't Not, Alanis Morissette  
  
  
"Leaving here doesn't mean I am leaving you," she glared at Chloe, who gathered her blanket and pillows closer to her chest, refusing to look at Hermione. Jervy, empty-eyed and dedicated as ever, clung closely to his young mistress. His hollow, watery eyes wandered from Hermione ג€" busy packing her sparse belongings ג€" to Chloe, who had been sitting at the end of her bed, shielded behind her bedclothes.  
  
The blue-eyed girl sighed. "Do you really believe there's a difference?"  
  
"Yes!" Hermione put aside the jeans she had intended to fold, turning to glower at her friend. "I would still be writing you, still be visiting you. Still love you."  
  
Chloe shook her head. "You would go on with your life. I would stay here, locked forever in my glass house. Bound to stagnate. Bound to my eternal youth. My eternal virginity. Now we're standing on even ground, we parallel each other. Once you move on, that's all over."  
  
"What do you want me to do?" She crossed her hands over her chest. "Stay here? Sacrifice myself in order to keep you company?"  
  
"Sweet." Chloe gave her a sugary smile. "Sometimes I wonder who taught you to be so cruel. But no. I want you to leave me be. I want you to move on with your life, be happy and leave me be."  
  
"Me? Cruel? And what would that make you, making a friend ashamed of her own fitness?"  
  
The other girl nodded tiredly. "You're right, I suppose. I'm bitter and unfit, which makes me cruel toward anyone who isn't. Iג€¦" a muscle in her jaw twitched. "It will only be worse once you're out of here, can't you realize that? You- writing me beautiful, enthusiastic letters about the full, engaging life you're leading, telling me about the interesting people you meet: about the mysteries you had encountered and solved: about the great sex you had, and I- withering a bit more with each letter, knowing you're someplace out there, living the life I should, by all means, live, but can't, damn it. Can't. Then you'll visit me, sun tanned and glowing and I'll be cruel and angry and bitter since all you have, and all you had have, should have been mine. Because I'd want that for myself. Can't you see? I'm jealous as it is. Do you want this jealousy to destroy me?"  
  
"No." She sighed. "I justג€¦ I just don't want to lose you."  
  
Chloe looked at her, eyes bright with tears. "I don't want to lose you either. But I don't want to lose my sanity."  
  
"That'sג€¦ so melodramatic." Hermione sighed.  
  
The other girl gave her a crooked smile. "Life is melodramatic. Or else it's boring. Either way, you are promised to hardly ever be satisfied with what you get."  
  
"Very witty."  
  
"And true," said Chloe, watching Hermione seal her suitcase. "Now come here and hug me. No, don't tell me you don't _do_ hugs-" tossing her bedclothes aside, she reached for Hermione, pulling the smaller girl close and coiling her arms around her midriff.  
  
"It feels awkward," Hermione noted, her fingers interlacing the vivacious mass of Chloe's baby-fine curls.  
  
"It feels good," Chloe murmured, nose and cheek pressing into Hermione's abdomen.  
  
Jervy, put aside like a huge rag doll, seemed to be reflecting Chloe's longing in his huge, empty eyes.  
  
"If I'll write you," she began, "will you answer me?"  
  
She could feel Chloe's features distorting into a frown against her belly. "I don't know," an answer came at last. "But I promise to read."  
  
"I suppose that's something."  
  
"I love you, Granger. I'll miss you plenty."  
  
Hermione moistened her lips, standing still as Chloe's body's warmth misted around her ג€" the way the bluish fog of dawn rose over the great lake, very early in the morning. Strangely, as awkward as she might have felt, the physical touch also provided her with a certain sense of complacency. As if Chloe's body was flexing to parallel her, to make her fitter, to make her stronger; to fill ג€" if only for a moment ג€" these abysmal gaps in her soul, and make her a whole person. Then they parted, and Hermione knew she would never be whole.  
  


* * *

  
  
She was hardly ready to be back at Hogwarts, and yet knew for certain she was as ready as she would ever be. How cliche. How true. It was mid May and the time to tie up all loose ends. _Like a girl_ , she found herself thinking, _who is determined to lose her virginity before she dies._ The thought seemed to haunt her on the ride back to Hogwarts. _So much to do before I die, but then- at least I've already lost my virginity._ The thought accompanied the bitter realization that the girl climbing down from the Knight Bus in front of Hogwarts' gates was not the same girl who fled the castle, and surely not the same girl who entered it, almost seven years ago. _The girl who entered it,_ she thought, _would have died a virgin._  
  
Leaving the Knight Bus, she nodded shortly towards the conductor. The pimpled youth had tried to hit on her during the ride. Her former self would have avoided him politely, ignoring his attention or evading it. She also knew, however, that the conductor would not pay attention to her former self. She wondered what was it that made the difference; was it her sudden awareness of her femininity or had she suddenly grown slutty? Did he know who she was, Hogwarts' former Head Girl, the one who slept with a professor and destroyed both their lives in one fell stroke? She hardly cared. She hardly cared for his tender feelings and let him know she was very busy and would appreciate if he did not disturb her reading. Hermione wished she could muster the same indifference in regard to the reaction of Hogwarts' inhabitants upon her return.  
  
Yes, of course, she had been to hell and back- their reaction should have been unimportant. And it _was_ unimportant in the artificial sense of things, where it was all a sentence wavering in a copywriter's mind, asking why should someone who had been to hell, care for her peers' reaction to anything? But then it rubbed her own sore spots, made her doubt her own fitness. When she once had been Hermione Granger-- a Head Girl, she now was Hermione Granger -- a lunatic ג€" and they knew it, and would look at her with pity in their eyes. Well, fuck them all. She wasn't about to dwell on people's disgusting habit of bestowing their pity on those who wanted it and needed it the least.  
  
She had forbidden Healer Morrow to notify her parents when she was discharged from St. Mungo's. Likely they would discover it soon enough; Hermione could not imagine them leaving her alone long enough for the scabs to heal and fall away. Likely the Hogwarts staff would keep them informed. But her tuition for the year was paid, and her choices were hers alone nowadays; she didn't have to open, ever, another letter from her parents, or ever go home again. She knew that not facing her parents, not addressing completely their role in her illness, meant that certain fractures were filled with jelly and not good, wholesome flesh.  
  
She had only three goals left: pass her NEWTs, do whatever was required of her to bring about Voldemort's demise, and somehow find Snape again.  
  
No...what Hogwarts thought about her, and what her parents thought about her, hardly mattered any longer.  
  
Breathing deeply, she shouldered her rucksack, and began climbing towards Hogwarts' gates. Earlier in the week, she owled Harry, notifying him concerning her upcoming arrival. Hermione had no doubt he would be waiting for her in front of the castle, ready to unburden her from what little luggage she had been carrying, chatting away in order to mask the metastatic silence.


	36. The War

_touch me,  
before we perish  
...  
the air  
darkens and is alive--  
  
\--from "XLVIII come a little further--why be afraid--"  
  
\-- e.e.cummings_  
  
  
  
The castle's residents were taking the noon meal in the Great Hall. The week before, Dumbledore had finally allowed Snape to take his meals with the rest of the population of the castle, provided he made no effort to see or otherwise disturb Hermione, recently returned from St. Mungo's in time for her NEWTs. Snape was careful to do nothing more than look, checking her hands and arms from a distance. Apart from her new thinness and somewhat dark circles beneath her eyes, Hermione looked much as she had at Angharad's cottage.  
  
Snape reflexively gripped the edge of the table as everything around him seemed to shudder. The castle shifted on its bedrock, all of the wooden beams in the Great Hall groaning at once in a shriek of ripping wood. He realized with something of a shock that he had just witnessed the collapse of Hogwarts' legendary wards.  
  
The Great Hall abruptly filled with ghosts. Peeves rocketed from side to side, wailing "They have come! Flee, flee!" Portraits on the walls keened nervously and ran from painting to painting, whispering tensely, seeking better hiding places in other pictures.  
  
The Bloody Baron appeared behind Dumbledore, whose palms flattened on the table. Nearly Headless Nick arrived a moment later. Other ghosts spurted into the enormous room, drifting like anxious smoke about the walls and ceiling. Hagrid got clumsily to his feet, nearly overturning the Head Table. His wildly hairy head roved from side to side as he sought the source of the problem.  
  
Snape also rose; his eyes found a group of three at the Gryffindor table. Three, always three: Potter, Granger, and Weasley, young warriors now, taut, tense, frightened. _Hermione and her bookends, thought Snape. Potter and his guards. Weasley and his two loves._ Snape was already running towards the Head Table as Dumbledore got to his feet and thundered, " _SILENCE!_ "  
  
As he passed the Slytherin table, Snape's hand snagged Malfoy and snatched him up out of his seat by his collar. "You must be with them."  
  
Oddly, Malfoy only nodded, lips tight.  
  
Snape kept running. "You know where to go," he ordered as he passed Hermione. "Take them with you."  
  
"But you -- Snape, _what about you?_ " She was up now and hurrying down the aisle, pacing him between Gryffindor and Ravenclaw.  
  
"I...I go to be with Minerva and Flitwick," he replied, with no real idea of how he could help, a wizard without magic. "I will come when I can. I will bring _him_ if I can. Be ready." He tossed the words over his shoulder at her, but did not stop.  
  
" _Impedimenta_!" cried Hermione, wand out, pointing at him. There was a collective gasp from the students around them. Most of them had no idea the Death Eaters were upon them; all they knew was that Hermione Granger had hexed a former teacher -- her former lover, at that -- and the castle seemed to be trembling in its foundations. The air was thick with fear and barely-contained curiosity.  
  
Snape sprawled in the aisle between Slytherin and Ravenclaw. An instant later, Hermione stood on the table above him. Inhaling deeply, she released the hex and commanded him to be still. In her eyes was that strange, distant look she got when she warded him before Voldemort's summonings. And there, tumbled like a discarded toy, Snape knew a moment of perfect clarity: a moment where he heard her voice murmuring the ancient spell of protection; felt her touch though she touched him not; sensed her magic coiling about him like the sweet fog of incense burned in the Circle; felt the absoluteness of her power and the monstrous hugeness of her love for him. He met her eyes for the space of a long breath, and then with a swirl of her wild hair, she was leaping down the table back toward Potter and Weasley, dancing between the platters and jugs and cutlery before she jumped to the bench, and then to the floor, to have her hands taken by her bookends and run for the doors of the Hall.  
  
"Harry!" croaked Dumbledore; but Potter did not stop. Snape skidded against the Head Table.  
  
"They go to do your dirty work, old man," said Snape. "As do I. I will stand with Minerva, or Flitwick, or both."  
  
Dumbledore's troubled blue eyes turned to him. "I fear for you this day, my boy."  
  
"Too late for that," he answered bitterly.  
  
But Dumbledore was already turning away. "Rubeus -- get the children to the dungeons. You know the secret way...take them to Hogsmeade underground. Get them away."  
  
"But -- Perfesser Dumbledore --" the giant protested. "I should be with you --"  
  
"No. Go! Filius, go with him. Minerva, Severus -- with me. Poppy, Vector, Sybil, Pomona -- the dormitory towers, check them all, get the children down to the dungeons. Argus -- the classrooms and baths -- no child can be left behind. Filius, wait for them there, then you and Argus take the rear. Professors Vector and Sprout...when the last child has gone, destroy the tunnel entrance. And then, my dears, I'm afraid you'll both be needed wherever the fighting is. Poppy, Sybil -- the infirmary, please." Dumbledore looked sad, and weary, and yet strong. Snape realized the planning for this moment had been fine-tuned for years. Snape was strangely ready to be a part of it, magic or no magic, as long as it came to an end.  
  
Students were already leaving the Hall -- Snape recognized many of them as the children of Death Eaters, and some of the rest as members of Dumbledore's Army. He groped for his wand, intending to slam the Hall doors shut to keep the students together, and remembered his disability afresh. These little lapses would get him killed, he knew. One moment of expecting and not finding the power he needed...that would be all it required for Voldemort or his minions to bring him down, despite Hermione's warding, which he could feel around him like a suit of cotton wool armor.  
  
Flitwick paused before following Hagrid. He fished in the pockets of his robe, finally dragging out one of his numberless swizzle sticks, and tossing it to Snape. "Your new wand, Potions Master."  
  
"It will do me no good, Filius," said Snape. He and Minerva prepared to follow Dumbledore.  
  
Flitwick's eyes were hard. "Not everyone knows what's become of your magic. You've been a successful actor for many years. Act again, Snape. Wave that stick like it means something."  
  
Snape looked down at him, the little man no one took seriously, and tucked the swizzle into his wand pocket. He nodded. "I will put it to good use."  
  
"And if you get close enough, it might yet serve to gouge an eye or two." And with wink he was away, bouncing behind Hagrid, who was shepherding students out of the Hall.  
  
The teachers scattered to their tasks. Those who had not been assigned a specific duty gathered at the head table, faces tense, wands at the ready, waiting for Dumbledore to lead them. His voice was grave and solemn when at last he spoke.  
  
"Today, my beloved friends and colleagues, we go to make an end of Voldemort. Pray it will be swift. Know that death awaits us beyond these stone walls; meet it with mercy, if you can; meet it with death in equal measure if you cannot." His lips hardened in their nest of curly white beard. "Know that there will be no mercy for you at their hands. Be bold. Be strong. In your love for each other is your greatness and your strength." His eyes traveled the group and came to rest at last on Snape. "Be the Light in the Dark, one final time."  
  
The old man's words were like a lance to Snape's heart, but he bowed his head nonetheless.  
  
"Here are your commanders," Dumbledore continued. Gone was the softness and reverence in his voice; instead, the huskiness of age lay over an edge of steel. "All the spirits in this hall, save Peeves -- follow the Baron and Nearly Headless Nick, and guard the castle entrances. Peeves, you are to stop any who make it past your peers. Do as you will; I give you free rein." With a delighted hoot, Peeves swooped away and shot through the stone wall.  
  
Dumbledore turned to look at a portrait behind him, where Phineas Nigellus had relocated from his normal place in the Headmaster's office. "Phineas. Notify the Order and the Ministry of Magic. We need help, and we need it now." With a stern nod, the gaunt man's image vanished from the frame.  
  
Dumbledore marked a third of the group with a wave of his wand. "You are with Madam Hooch. Engage the Death Eaters directly; your stand will be the Quidditch field."  
  
Dumbledore indicated a second group. "You are with me. We will guard the castle from without, hold off the enemy until the children are safely away. Then we will fight wherever we are needed."  
  
And at last Dumbledore came forward to touch Snape and Minerva on their shoulders. "The remaining third -- you are with Minerva and Severus. Show her the way, Severus. Minerva, be his shield, be his wand. Go, and find the Dark Lord, and do what you must to end him." Minerva gave a great shudder, though she was silent and controlled.  
  
"To your tasks, go!" Headmaster Dumbledore raised his wand. A jet of bright light spiraled from its tip over his listeners' heads. Snape closed his eyes a moment as a strange sensation of blessedness washed over him, then he opened them again to watch the first two groups Disapparating -- with the wards gone, there was no longer a hindrance.  
  
"To the front gates!" cried Snape.  
  


~*~

  
  
Snape and Minerva's little band of teachers and support staff stood between the two stone posts of the front gate.  
  
"Why here?" asked Minerva, looking at Snape.  
  
"He'll want to make a dramatic entrance," said Snape. "Where better, than to march right in? Of course, I've been wrong before."  
  
They heard panting behind them. Minerva and several others whirled, and Snape heard Minerva gasp. "Children, go back to the castle at once! You are to go underground to Hogsmeade!"  
  
"We won't," said Lavender Brown sternly. "We are part of the DA...we have trained, and we're ready." Other classmates nodded.  
  
"I'll find Ron, if I cannot stand with you," stated Ginny Weasley, looking firmly at her Head of House.  
  
"You're a pack of foolhardy, stupidly brave Gryffindors and Hufflepuff hangers-on!" hissed Snape, turning round. "Merlin save us from you. If you think this will be simple work -- think again. You may die here today, and you may have to kill. Are you prepared for that?" He glared at them. Several of the DA members blanched, but none of them lowered their wands or backed down.  
  
Ginny's pale face pinkened. "I want to fight," she said clearly, to Snape. "Weasleys know what's right. Luna, Cho and Anthony took their team to the Quidditch pitch. The rest are guarding the castle with the Headmaster."  
  
Seamus Finnigan and Dean Thomas stood shoulder to shoulder. "We fight here, whether you like it or not," said Finnigan.  
  
" _Merlin_ ," muttered Snape, returning his attention to the road. "Stand with a teacher. Stay back until you know which end of your wands to point. And no foolish Gryffindor grandstanding. Remember your curses, your hexes. Your charms. Your shield charms, especially."  
  
"Something's coming," said Minerva tensely. Her wand lifted to indicate a shimmer growing just beyond the gate.  
  
"Where?" demanded Snape. He couldn't see what she was seeing. He drew Flitwick's swizzle stick, though it would have no effect except perhaps to demoralize an enemy or two that hadn't heard about the loss of his magic. He could feel only a vast chasm where his magic should be. _Voldemort, you bastard_ , he thought. _Come where I can see you. Let me lead you to your doom._  
  
"Just -- _there_!" shrieked Neville Longbottom.  
  
And suddenly the Death Eaters were among them.  
  
The pops! of Apparition seemed to happen everywhere. Bolts of _Stupefy_ and _Impedimenta_ began to fly from Snape's and Minerva's warriors. But the Death Eaters were not bound by their consciences, and the brutal spells smacked harshly against shields and wards. Snape knew from experience that such defenses would quickly wear thin. He heard a shriek and felt someone grabbing his robe from behind. He snatched behind him and jerked forward, threatening with his swizzle before he saw it was Longbottom. "Remember your _Stupefy_ ," he whispered fiercely to the sandy-haired boy, who was pale and sweating. "You know I cannot protect you."  
  
"I will protect _you_ , s-sir," stammered Longbottom.  
  
" _Gryffindors_ ," muttered Snape, releasing him. It was all he could do not to laugh in bitter resignation. Had Longbottom been wielding a cauldron filled with a typical troubled Longbottom potion, Snape might have felt more confident that the Death Eaters should fear the boy.  
  
Their little group was surrounded. They backed into a tight circle, with the students on the inside ring, except for Neville, who slid out and stood in front of Snape, wand at the ready, its wood darkened from the sweat on his palm.  
  
" _Stupefy_!" shouted Snape, pointing his swizzle. A bare instant behind him Minerva shot the same spell to the place Snape indicated. They moved forward, Snape with his hand on Neville's shoulder to propel him along. "Shield yourself, boy," he hissed. "I can't feel your shield."  
  
" _Protego_ ," said Longbottom. As they neared a Death Eater, clad in black with a silver mask, Snape felt the boy begin to tremble.  
  
"Get behind me. I am warded; it may be enough."  
  
"No!" shrieked Longbottom. His wand was waving wildly, and Snape realized it was a cheering charm that Neville scribed in the air -- one of the first charms a Hogwarts student learned. He groaned, about to drag the boy to the ground when the Death Eater in front of them faltered, long enough for Minerva to cast _Petrificus_ and have it hit. When the Death Eater fell, his mask skittered away across the gravel of the drive, and Snape saw a terrible rictus smile on his face. _Goyle. Happy at last?_ Snape's hand clenched on Longbottom's shoulder and he whispered, hurriedly. "Again, boy -- it worked. He couldn't speak his incantation!"  
  
Longbottom gasped a breathless, frightened laugh. The three of them managed to bring down two more Death Eaters -- McNair, and perhaps one of the Lestrange relatives -- before Snape realized they were getting too far from their group. Spells were thick in the air; he could feel them striking and thinning the warding Hermione had placed upon him. Eventually, he knew, it would fail. Already he could smell the sulfurous odor of Dark incantations wafting through the perforations in the wards. A well-placed spell could be his undoing.  
  
He risked a look back over his shoulder. His band of brave souls had pinched themselves tighter. Too tight. He shouted at them to separate, not to make such an easy target, and turned to run toward them, instruct them...  
  
...and found his path blocked by none other than Lord Voldemort, with Lucius at his side.  
  
"There you are, _traitor_ ," spat Voldemort. "What, not dead yet?"  
  
Behind Snape, Longbottom moaned. Minerva moved to stand shoulder to shoulder with Snape. He could feel her trembling, and slid his arm around her. He raised his swizzle and aimed it straight between Voldemort's eyes. "As you see," said Snape, leaning a bit heavily on Minerva to feign weakness. "Not dead _yet_." He was ready to clutch at her so she could Disapparate them to the Circle when the time came.  
  
Voldemort laughed at the gaudy blue and silver glass rod in Snape's hand. "Your new wand?" he asked. "A fitting choice, squib." His gaze slid to Minerva, who stiffened. Her wand arm was raised and curved over her head, ready to make a direct shot, or to deflect. Voldemort's lips curled in a sneer. "I see you need women to work your magic for you now."  
  
Snape tightened his arm about Minerva's waist, feeling her shoulder nudge harder into him, her hand slipping behind him to grip tightly at his belt through his robes. She was telling him without words that she awaited his signal.  
  
"Minerva has been helpful," he said to Voldemort and Lucius. "My little group took down three of your Death Eaters. Though -- _my lord_ \-- I see you have waited until we are tired before you arrived yourself."  
  
"I see no reason for you to have tired so quickly, traitor. You cannot fight." His lipless mouth opened in a smile. " _Crucio_."  
  
The spell sizzled and sparked against Hermione's warding, but beyond weakening the wards, had no ill effects. With a vile and three-cornered smile copied from Minerva, Snape replied, "Can I not? Tell me, Riddle, what use have you made of my magic?"  
  
The wizard's red eyes slitted. "I'll hex your disrespectful tongue, Snape. I should have known a wizard such as Flamel would never invent an effective Dark spell. Your magic bled away immediately."  
  
"You wasted my skills, my magic?" Snape sneered. "It would have been better to kill me." Inwardly he railed at the injustice; to have his magic taken, and not used -- it was as if his lifeblood had been poured on the ground, less valuable than oak water spilled for the new moon.  
  
"Ah, but this way I forced Dumbledore to expose his spy. Perhaps I will kill you now, though." That blackened yew wand began to lift again.  
  
Snape spoke very softly, gesturing to Lucius. "Why is your guard not watching your back?"  
  
It was enough. Voldemort's head whipped about on his thin neck, and he saw Snape's ploy, for there was no one behind him. But that second's distraction was all Snape needed, and he hissed to Minerva, "Now! To the Circle!" just loud enough for Voldemort to hear as his face swiveled back.  
  
Minerva Disapparated them only milliseconds before the blast of Voldemort's wand created a crater in the grass where they had stood.  
  


~*~

  
  
"Snape!" Hermione's voice throbbed with a thrilling undertone that was nearly his undoing. She ran to him, her hands patting him, seeking wounds. "My wards are holding -- weakened, but holding," she breathed. "And the battle?"  
  
Snape pushed her aside, longing to take her in his arms and whisper to her to Disapparate them to Angharad's cottage. Let the others fight this war: he was done. "We have only seconds. Voldemort follows, for I have angered him. Ready yourselves. Potter, Weasley -- over there, behind that secondary altar. Minerva -- shelter behind something if you can, though once the vortex rises you'll be forced into or out of the circle. Malfoy, hide where you can, though it would be best if you leave now. Your father is coming for you. You'll be safe with him."  
  
"I'm not leaving Harry," said Draco.  
  
Snape blinked, but could not spend the time required to persuade him otherwise. "Very well. Hermione -- your sickle." He was pleased to see she had already prepared an offering -- a large one -- for the Needfire to consume. It was mostly wood and would be long-lasting; the tips of larch boughs; birch bark and twigs, and, astonishingly, mistletoe. "Well done," he said to her. Her anxious expression vanished for the briefest of seconds behind a dazzling smile. "Begin," he said to her. "I'll supply the blood."  
  
He stood, waiting, Hermione's sickle clutched in his right hand, Flitwick's swizzle stowed in his wand pocket. His gaze traveled over the girl in front of him as she hastily saluted first the sun, and then welcomed the moon. His eyes came to rest on a small, sharp white stone lying on the ground. A shard lay next to it, clearly chipped from it, and abruptly Snape was taken by a memory, the chill wind of a superstitious thrill: his own words.  
  
 _Severus: "At Samhain, many villages built their own bonfire for the celebration. Those villagers who participated would choose a stone, one they would recognize later, and give it to the fire. And afterwards, legend tells us that when the fire was burned out, the villager whose stone was different, or misplaced, or cracked, for example, would be the next one taken in the Spring rite, to shed blood, to make the land fertile."  
  
Hermione: "A gruesome lottery."  
  
"Yes. Nonetheless, I thought we might each place a stone into the Needfire, by way of honoring tradition, though neither of us will be slaughtered come Spring."_  
  
It was spring, and now Snape waited for the Dark Lord to come into his Circle. He held no illusions and no hope. Voldemort would slaughter him for his impertinence this time.  
  
Voldemort and Lucius appeared in the stone avenue leading to the Circle. Snape heard Weasley's soft, low gasp of, " _Merlin!_ " and something that sounded like a growl from Potter, almost a chant, repeated over and over. "This ends today," said Lily's boy. "It _is_ that simple."  
  
"Hurry," said Snape to Hermione. He nicked his thumb with the blade. Voldemort was striding energetically toward the Circle. _Yes. Come into my Circle._  
  
"East, into the first of the Night," cried Hermione, watching as a single drop of Snape's blood fell into the heap of branches, needles, and white berries that was the offering. Her eyes flicked up to see Voldemort almost inside, Lucius lagging a few paces behind.  
  
"Faster," said Snape. He could almost smell her terror. Determination was stamped across her face, even as she clenched her fists to keep from crying out as Weasley had done.  
  
"West, into the last of the Light." Another drop. He could hear the tension mounting in her voice.  
  
"South, into the warm Spark." Another.  
  
"North, into the chill Dark." And the last.  
  
And at last, Voldemort stepped into the Circle. His loyal followers began to appear at a little distance, popping one by one into view, summoned to his side by their Dark Marks.  
  
"Call it, Hermione. Call it now," gasped Snape. He still held the sickle, and prayed that if his death was to come this beautiful spring afternoon, it would wait just a few more seconds.  
  
Hermione lifted her head and called down the Needfire, and as she did so, Snape gashed the sickle over his inner arm and released a salty red tide: a flood of his life's fluid, over the stone. Blood enough to splash; blood enough to trickle into the channels cut into the altar's edges to conduct the offering around the entire border. Hermione gasped, "No! Snape, no!"  
  
The vortex rose, suddenly and harshly, glittering with a silver light Snape had never seen before. Minerva, too close to the outer edge of the Stone near which she was sheltering, was suddenly thrust outside the Circle, where she stumbled and fell from the force. Lucius, not understanding the Circle and its power, simply walked forward into the sparkling annulus, and was thrown violently, landing many feet back on the avenue. He groaned, turned on his side, and lay still. Draco, seeing his father injured, emerged from his hiding place in reaction.  
  
"Father!"  
  
His cry attracted the red eyes of Voldemort, who, glancing about him, realized he was alone.  
  
"Yes," hissed Snape. "Yes, Riddle -- you are alone here, with us."  
  
Voldemort waved his wand in a complex pattern, creating a strong shield. "Lucius," he called. "To me. Bring the others!"  
  
"They can't come in," said Potter, rising.  
  
"And you can't get out," finished Weasley, rising as well. Two wands were leveled at Voldemort, who began to laugh.  
  
"How entertaining. You needn't think that three children and a squib will end this," sneered Voldemort.  
  
"Four children," corrected Malfoy, moving to stand by Potter.  
  
Voldemort began moving slowly toward a gap between two Stones. "Don't be stupid, Malfoy," he hissed. "Stand by me as your father would and I will reward you. Stand with these fools and you will die, for I will kill you myself." While everyone's attention was fixed on Potter, Malfoy and Voldemort, Snape scanned the Circle. The twinkling extended into the dome of force above them, a white magic much like the dome that had protected the castle not long ago. Voldemort stretched a thin hand behind him to touch the Stones.  
  
"That's enough blood," whispered Hermione, coming around the altar.  
  
"The more blood, the stronger the force," Snape murmured back, never taking his eyes off the Dark Lord, whose fingers twitched back from the whirlpool's edge. _Good! Very good!_  
  
"I need to close that gash," she insisted, "but to do that I must unward you...only for a moment, Snape --"  
  
"Not now." He spared her a glance; she had paled, and was staring at the pulsing of the blood, running from his arm down his fingers, to drip thickly onto the altar. The Needfire glowed a dark, rich blue; deeper than he had ever seen it. An unearthly blue that hurt his eyes. He knew how the sight of her own blood had affected him as she lay unconscious in their bed in the cottage, and could only guess at her horror now.  
  
Suddenly Voldemort levitated above them, seeking to fly over the edge of the Stones and out of the Circle. Potter and Weasley, standing tight together, fired bolts of _Stupefy_ into the arching ceiling of the Circle, striking Voldemort's shield, and having no impact. The serpent wizard laughed.  
  
"Do what you think you can, fools!" he cried. "For I will destroy --" and suddenly he rose no further. It was the feathered cape again, rising, circling, but trapped.  
  
Snape knew, as the red eyes turned toward him in astonished fury, that his time was at an end. Voldemort knew who was responsible for building this trap and luring him inside. The scorched wand, the wand that had swallowed his own magic, turned upon him from above and the battle began in earnest. Blasts of Unforgivables and twisted hexes shot from the top of the Circle. Snape heard all four students crying their _Protegos_ and dodging the blasts. Hermione stood in front of him, one hand on her wand pointing to the sky, and the other groping behind her for his shoulder, to force him down behind her own shield magic. Snape felt light-headed and complied, kneeling for the moment, until he could think of what more he might do. He used the sickle to slash at the hem of his robe and tear free a strip of cloth. Hermione was right; he had bled enough. Much more, and he would be of no use to the four students. Using his teeth and his right hand, he bound up his deep cut.  
  
Potter and Weasley began streaming sinking spells at the Dark Lord, who gradually dropped from the top of the dome until his feet were on the ground again. Malfoy had moved to stand close by, and was providing additional _Protego._  
  
"What goes up, must come down," sneered Weasley, his shield magic glowing in front of him.  
  
"You will be first to die," hissed Voldemort, shooting a ferocious Avada Kedavra at the panting, red-headed giant.  
  
"NO!" shrieked Hermione, and Snape stared as a strong blast of wandless magic struck Weasley and shoved him from the path of the unblockable curse. Abandoning Snape with a fearful backward look, Hermione went to join the young men in the battle.  
  
" _Merlin!_ " cursed Snape, his heart breaking as he watched her sprint into the thick of the fray. More than anything else, he wanted his magic. He wanted these children to live past this day. He tied off his bandage tightly, and went to the edge of the Circle. He could feel, with all the Dark Magic tangling around him, that Hermione's wards around him were thinning quickly. He circled the Stones until he could see Minerva, lying apparently senseless outside the Circle where its power had flung her. Ringing the Circle itself were a number of masked Death Eaters, some he recognized from their height and stances, many he did not. A few were launching spells toward the Circle, vainly trying to break through the wall of force. A few of the teachers and DA members had discovered something amiss at the Circle, and were engaging the Death Eaters in brief skirmishes.  
  
Snape heard a tremendous rumbling, and turned in time to see the Divination tower, almost a mile to the north, slide to earth with a noise like an avalanche. He spared a thought for the others, fighting at its base or from its tower windows. Doubtless, more dead.  
  
Hogwarts castle was falling to the Dark.  
  
Voldemort saw it too; and his triumphant laugh was nearly palpable. He redoubled his efforts with the four students, easily turning back their spells and beginning to break through their shield magic with well-placed curses. As he advanced, the four retreated slowly toward the altar. Various Unforgivables struck them glancing blows. Soon Hermione had changed wand hands, favoring a swelling elbow, and Weasley began to limp. Potter's scar was throbbing and reddened, with livid white flesh around it, making the scar itself appear to glow like a traffic light, pulsing with the combined fury of Potter and Voldemort. Snape moved back toward the altar behind them. Potter was hurling curses alternately with his wand and his outstretched, wandless left hand, and Snape could only wonder at the determined skill of the three. Where had they learned such magic?  
  
"Spread out, spread out!" he cried. "Force him to defend against multiple targets!"  
  
Voldemort snarled, aiming a brutal and fearsome _Avada Kedavra_ at Snape, who sprawled behind the altar stone to let it take the force of the blow. The Needfire flickered and dimmed but held, and he swore, scrambling away. At all costs, the Needfire must continue to burn.  
  
"Ah," hissed Voldemort. "I begin to see how you built this cage, Snape. That fire is the source. Very well. I will quench it." And he pointed his wand at the altar, preparing a new spell.  
  
"No," said Draco, moving to place himself in front of the altar. "You will not!"  
  
"I have not killed you before now for your father's sake," said Voldemort. "But that mercy is at an end, _boy_." And before Snape, scrambling on all fours over the grass of the Circle, could reach Malfoy to knock him aside, Voldemort's Killing Curse had struck him. In the briefest of moments, Malfoy's astonished face turned to Potter, and then Malfoy fell across Snape.  
  
Dead.  
  
Voldemort's lipless mouth sneered in pleasure. "My first kill of the day," he sighed on a long exhalation. "Like wine."  
  
Potter made an incoherent noise of grief, a howl that became a name, droning discordantly in Snape's head like the wail of bagpipes played out of tune. "Noooooooo... _Draco_!" Potter lunged at Voldemort, who managed to blast a spell past Potter's shield, knocking his legs out from under him so that Potter, too, fell across Snape and Draco's lifeless body. Potter's wand skittered over the altar, perilously close to the Needfire. Potter groped for it, unseeing, not finding it; he could only focus on Draco's clear, grey eyes, open to the late afternoon sky. Spell after spell followed from Voldemort, splattering against the students' shield magic, as Potter, entranced by his sudden tragedy, fumbled.  
  
"Harry!" shrieked Hermione. "Get up!"  
  
"Oy!" yelled Weasley, then spat out a _Confundus_ that even Snape, without his magic, felt baffled by as it rebounded off Voldemort's own shield magic. Blinking to clear his brain, he looked back at Potter.  
  
This close, Snape could see the grief and rage that was nearly splitting the young wizard in two. Potter's magic was flaring hugely, unfocused and astounding. Snape could feel hatred, HATRED, and love, enormous love, pouring from Harry, burning Harry, consuming him as the Needfire consumed its offerings. But more than anything, power, uncontrolled and undirected. _Dumbledore's sword_ , he thought. _More like Dumbledore's sledge hammer._  
  
Voldemort approached closer, sending a blasting spell towards Hermione and Weasley, standing tight together in front of him, trying desperately to guard those on the ground. Weasley was knocked aside to the left, and Hermione to the right. Snape saw her land against one of the Stones, her snarl of hair lifting wildly in the force of the vortex, but she lay still and her eyes were closed.  
  
"Get up," snarled Snape at Potter. "Your wand! Fight or you will die!"  
  
The Dark Lord loomed over them, his teeth showing in his lipless smile. He looked ravenous, hungry for the lives of the two that sprawled below him. " _Expelliarmus!_ " he hissed, and Potter's wand shot away, bursting into flame. "Now," he said, still smiling. "Now, Potter." He drew back his arm, the black wand following the motions of Potter's head like a cobra watching the charmer's flute, and prepared his Killing Curse yet again.  
  
There was a sudden movement above Snape -- Potter, shifting position -- and then Snape felt Hermione's sickle snatched from his hand. There was a confusing sweep and arc of motion, the glitter of the sickle, dimmed with Snape's own blood. But the sickle was larger than Snape had ever seen it, flaming and flaring, singing high and sweet like lightning just before it meets its target.  
  
A blinding flash filled the dome. Snape heard a shriek, unearthly, like that of rending trees and earth. His vision filled with Potter, Potter rising, Potter slashing, Potter screaming in rage, his magic funneled into a single cry: " _Draco!_ "  
  
That lightning-bright blade moved and Voldemort's belly opened to the spring sky and a gout of blood fountained over Snape and Potter and the altar, and the Needfire flared and flamed upward as Voldemort fell, astonished and terrible, across the altar, a violent sacrifice. And with a sob, Potter lifted his hand again, and Voldemort's head thudded from its neck, his red eyes looking into Snape's own.  
  
Snape felt the change instantly. So much blood, evil blood, all at once on the altar of the Circle. The whirling and humming became a pulsing throb, a vile heartbeat, slow at first, but gaining speed like a manic metronome. He could feel every beat in his Dark Mark, and knew from the way Potter clapped his palm to his forehead, that the beat was echoing in the boy's scar.  
  
"Get away from it, get away!" cried Snape, pushing Draco's body off him and scrabbling toward Hermione. "It will destroy itself rather than be contaminated by such as that!" How he knew this, he could not tell. He was shouting at Potter above the noise of the Circle, the fearsome wind that swirled and spun and howled like a cyclone.  
  
Potter stood staring, astonished, surprised, disbelieving -- at Voldemort -- _dead?_ Snape realized the boy could not believe that the evil wizard had _stopped_ , had been _ended_ , by the horrific blows from the golden sickle, transfigured by the tide of grief.  
  
Snape's hands groped for Hermione and pulled her into his arms, his back to the altar, his face turned toward it for he could not look away from the horror that was Voldemort, arching and writhing in the torrent of the Needfire. He could feel her breathing in his arms and knew the sharpness of regret -- she would not survive -- and yet, the wonder of love, and at last, a sort of twisted peace.  
  
"We will be killed," he gasped.  
  
"Not this day," cried Potter harshly, dragging Draco's body with him and helping Weasley behind the secondary altar. "Not this day!" he repeated, with certainty.  
  
The pace of the throbbing increased until it was almost a steady roar, a frenetic drumbeat. Snape stretched Hermione on the ground and covered her body with his to shield her from whatever he could. As he did so, she began to stir, to open her eyes and stare up at him, her face nicked with cuts and curse-wounds.  
  
"Am I dead? What's that awful noise?"  
  
"Not dead," he gasped, but he had never been so glad to hear a voice in his life. "Merlin -- Hermione! Potter's done it, but our Circle will explode..." And then he stopped speaking, for once again Hermione was chanting her ancient warding spell, this time warding them both, and as she finished she drew his head down to hers, to bind him to her with a breathless kiss, mouth on mouth. Around them the Circle blew outward from the Stones and upward from the altar, destroying the last of the Dark Lord and Snape's ring of force. The clenched fist of mingled magic, harsh Darkness and dazzling Light, crashed over them like a wall falling, and Snape knew nothing more.  
  


~*~

  
  
Much later, in the makeshift Infirmary that had been the Great Hall of Hogwarts castle, open to the starry night where the wall with the Divination Tower had once stood, Snape allowed Poppy to heal his gashed forearm and the various other bruises and wounds on his body. Hermione, Potter, and Weasley huddled in their usual place at the long Gryffindor table, but they were not speaking; their heads were close together in their gathering of grief and desperate search for comfort.  
  
The three had survived the destruction of the Circle, as had Snape, though they were not unscathed. All of them were bandaged and under observation; Potter's scar, like Snape's Dark Mark, had burst wide open when Voldemort's corpse was destroyed in the altar blast. Hermione had a concussion. Weasley's leg would never be the same; his thigh muscle had been strangely altered by Voldemort's cursing, and Poppy could not heal it. He would be sent to St. Mungo's soon.  
  
Lucius was nowhere to be found. Minerva was in severe condition, injured twice by the Circle, first as it had forced her out, and then as one of the large Stones shattered and rained upon her when the Circle exploded. Yet, though the Stone had injured her, it had protected her from the worst of the blast. She had been taken to St. Mungo's. Most of the Death Eaters that had gathered around the edge of the Circle were dead, destroyed by shrapnel from the Stones.  
  
Flitwick, Hagrid and Filch had come limping back up from the tunnel to Hogsmeade. At the other end, they had met a contingent of Death Eaters who apparently knew of the escape route. They had sent the children back through the tunnel to the castle in the end, and together with Hagrid's and Filch's muscle and Flitwick's charms, had managed to unblock the end and bring the children back. A few had been lost to the Death Eaters, and still others, children of Death Eaters themselves, had slipped away in the fray and the darkness of the tunnel.  
  
Longbottom had risen from the blast-crater of Voldemort's hex like something horrific climbing out of a grave, bloody and damaged, but alive.  
  
Trelawney was dead, killed when her tower collapsed, for she had been in her chamber seeking to scry the future and the end of the War.  
  
Seamus Finnigan, Remus Lupin and Professor Vector, who had been standing back-to-back with Dumbledore when the Tower collapsed, were killed, along with Hogwarts' Headmaster. A group of Death Eaters, routed by Madam Hooch's brave warriors at the Quidditch pitch, had formed a tight knot just out of sight of Dumbledore's small faction. They used their wand-blasts to vaporize the underpinnings of the Divination tower and drop the entire thing on Dumbledore and his fighters. Other Order of the Phoenix members were wounded, but seemed largely intact.  
  
The Ministry people had arrived too late to be of much use, which, as Snape said bitterly and succinctly when Poppy mentioned it, was nothing new. Poppy put them all to work in the Hogwarts environs, carrying in the dead and the wounded, and having them work small healing spells, since the fighters were too exhausted.  
  
Presently, Hermione got up from the table and came to sit next to Snape on the bench where he hunched over Flitwick's chipped swizzle stick, turning it in his fingers. She put her small, square, scraped and cut hand on his thigh and he heard her sigh when his own hand clasped hers tightly to lace their fingers.  
  
"It's over," she said finally, after sitting in silence for some time.  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Harry is devastated. Draco is gone."  
  
"A lot of us are gone," Snape said. He was surprised by how Dumbledore's death seemed to tear at his soul, even through the joy of knowing Minerva and Flitwick were alive.  
  
"Harry really loved him, you know."  
  
"I know," said Snape heavily. "We wicked Slytherins, Malfoy and I, and our Gryffindor loves." He clutched her hand tightly; too tightly, he knew, he could feel her bones protesting; but she said nothing and only pressed her side closer to his own.  
  
"Harry's wand was destroyed in the blast."  
  
Snape handed over the swizzle. "He may have mine. Much good may it do him," he said bitterly.  
  
Hermione tucked the swizzle in her wand pocket with the smallest of smiles. "I'm sure he'll be grateful." There was a long pause, then she spoke again. "I have a question to ask you, Snape."  
  
"I still love you, if that's what you want to know." His voice was quiet and ragged.  
  
She laughed a little strangely, a little breathlessly. "Not exactly what I was going to ask, yet -- that's good to know."  
  
"Then...what?"  
  
"What will you do, now?"  
  
"I will go back to Angharad's cottage. There is a life for me there, I think."  
  
"Snape." Her free hand moved to cup his chin and turn his face to hers. "Answer me this: is it time?"  
  
He closed his wild grey eyes to the searching glow in her dark brown ones. _Is it time? Angharad, Minerva, Lily -- is it time? Can I ask this girl to be with me always? So young, Snape...so young._  
  
And in his rational mind, despite all they had been through together, he knew the answer was no. They both had to heal, first. His heart knotted inside him.  
  
She leaned forward and kissed his mouth. Snape, his lashes fluttering in the flood of emotion, felt his lips part with a gasping, terrible hunger, and pressed his hand over hers where it touched his face. In a moment she was drawing away. His eyes opened and stared into hers; he fell into their black rose centers, never to be free.  
  
"No," he said, softly.  
  
"I think I knew that, too," she whispered. Her hand trembled against his face. "But I'll see you again, Snape. I remember our agreement. I'll see the world. I'll try new things."  
  
"You'll love other men." He saw her eyes brim with tears that she did not allow to fall, and he dreamed there; he drowned there. Her mouth tightened; the edges of her teeth worried her lower lip, and then she rose abruptly, releasing his hand.  
  
"We'll see," she said, and walked away, not looking back, to become one of the trio again. Snape bowed his head. In those brown eyes lived all the magic he would ever need, and he had sent it away.


	37. Letters

"Thank you India  
Thank you terror  
Thank you disillusionment  
Thank you frailty  
Thank you consequence  
Thank you thank you silence  
  
The moment I let go of it was  
The moment I got more than I could handle  
The moment I jumped off of it was  
The moment I touched down"  
  
\--Thank U, Alanis Morissette  
  
  
 _it may not always be so; and i say  
that if your lips, which i have loved, should touch  
another's, and your dear strong fingers clutch  
his heart, as mine in time not far away;  
if on another's face your sweet hair lay  
in such a silence as i know, or such  
great writhing words as, uttering overmuch,  
stand helplessly before the spirit at bay;  
  
if this should be, i say if this should be--  
you of my heart, send me a little word;  
that i may go unto him, and take his hands,  
saying Accept all heppiness from me.  
Then shall i turn my face, and hear one bird  
sing terribly afar in the lost lands.  
  
\--"it may not always be so" -- e e cummings_  
  
  
  
  
 **Chapter 37 -- Letters**  
  
  
Dear Snape,  
  
A month ago I landed in New Delhi. India is a good place to be. I found out I can climb up a train, no matter what the station, and climb down wherever I want. And one way or the other, whether I know where I am or have lost my way -- I am. When I cry I cry, and when I'm crazy, it's okay too. Nobody's listening and I am left to myself - only me and the stoic cows that don't distinguish the rich from the poor and solemnly lick the Ganges' filthy, polluted waters.  
  
There are nights when the sky speeds above me; a smallish figure sitting on the roof of a train carriage. There are nights in rooms with ceilings so low I must bend in order to get in; rooms full of scampering cockroaches which straighten up their sensitive antennae and stare at me curiously. When I cannot fall asleep, I get up and go. Sometimes I want to die. I don't delude myself to think that the distance would change, or cure me. Wanting to die in India is like wanting to die in Britain. The cage of the human experience is like a gibbet. When I left England, I took myself on the journey. I took the death-wish and the memories and the nightmares that keep haunting me at night. I took this body which is short and thin, and the bright curls and the brown eyes. I took Ron and Harry and everyone who died, and I took you.  
  
Sometimes it's if we're still together; lying next to each other on the dewy grass. Several stars are hanging at the edge of the sky, like tears I'm almost crying, and I can feel your chest rise and fall under my cheek as you breathe. We held hands, I think, or else I imagined us holding hands - how sentimental of me. I want to touch you everywhere, as if by spreading my fingers and stamping them against your abdomen, I would become part of you - and part of the entity which is you would seep through my skin. That if I could only touch you I'd be whole and happy and know what it is to have strong, blue-white, slightly damp hands, and it would fit. That we would be fine together.  
  
Three days ago I shaved my head. For ten years I didn't let a pair of scissors come near my head. You'd probably laugh, but I felt as if my mane - my bird's-nest hair, as you had affectionately called it - was like a princess's crown. My wreath. My turret. I'd plait it into a braid and the heaviness on my back held a certain sweetness. Like a hiding place amongst the bushes and ferns which was mine and mine alone to share or to keep secret. Nevertheless, after almost a month here in India, I understood I had no place left in which to hide from myself. A Dutch girl I met a week ago volunteered to give me a haircut, and then shave my head. She touched my shorn locks with reverence, sweetly caressing the curls that fell to the floor.  
  
She called me Joe, as if she had been attempting to share childhood memories. I didn't take, Snape. It was time to be left on my own. I cried and I laughed that night. I vomited my soul into a filthy basin and there was no one to hold my hand and tell me everything was fine. No one to prevent me from scraping my palms clean. I didn't, though. Everything was so dirty. I became dirty as well. Perhaps I became clean. In the mirror, my bald head was white and shining. I hated it and hated me. But it didn't matter. Not anymore.  
  
I love the Indian patience. The illuminated ones, sweet with incense, swarming with gods. The insipid patience, empty-eyed, hollow, vapid. I love the people that are like clay forms, anointed with glaze. I love the colorful linens and the stench of urine, coming off the monks that are begging for food. I am part of a mob, pilgrims in a private or collective crusade, and I'm dirtied over my head with this country.  
  
I don't know what I'm looking for. I don't know what my catharsis looks like. Not every love and not every pain has a name. When it's time, Snape, I'll come to you.  
  
Love,  
Hermione.  
  
  


~*~

  
  
30 July  
Oxfordshire  
  
  
Dear Hermione,  
  
Your first letter contained no date. I have no idea when it was written. Please date any future letters.  
  
Why choose India? Kindly ensure that you are disinfecting all water that you touch or consume. A simple _Sterila_ charm should suffice. The wand motion that accompanies the charm is a sharp, straight flick from upper right to lower left, followed by a jab to the front.  
  
I have at last retrieved all my belongings from Hogwarts. My books are safely shelved in the cottage. The doing of this would have taken considerable time and expense had Minerva not taken pity upon me and sent them all by the Knight Bus last month.  
  
I believe Angharad's garden will produce a number of useful plant products this summer. My seedlings are healthy and flourishing. The cutting of black rose that I took from the Forbidden Forest has rooted, though it did not like the sunny windowsill of the cottage kitchen. It much prefers the shade to be found beneath the northern eaves of the house, where it has begun to stretch above the windowsill. In the Forest these roses are ramblers, and climb recklessly. I have hopes for the northern wall of the cottage, and perhaps the rose will win its competition with the ubiquitous ivy. I have some thoughts for distilling the dark perfume of the petals. I will send some to you once it is prepared.  
  
You speak of the patience of the Indians. I, too, am learning patience. I will say that watering the garden is tiresome work without magic. I am having a workman look into arranging a watering system. Yet there is something soothing in the rote motions of drawing the water from the well, pouring it precisely.  
  
I continue our rituals at Angharad's Circle. There is a certain serenity to be obtained from the practice, I find, even though I no longer believe I require the Circle's protection from Voldemort or his followers. Still, it is perhaps reassuring to you that I take every reasonable precaution.  
  
You have shaved your head.  
  
This seems a poor choice to me, one unsuited for Hogwarts' Former Head Girl. The bird's nest held many secrets within its coils. Upon second thought, perhaps that is why you have cut it off.  
  
Yours,  
Severus Snape  
  
  


~*~

  
  
2 April  
  
Americans are a noisy, cheerful lot. Self-centered and abundant in their gaiety. This nation reminds me of a child. Its sense of joy is that of a child, without thousand years of history to restraint its movements and make it aware of the more complicated aspects of life. Did you know that the sands of Florida are white? Sugar white, and this seashore could have been the last crumble of a cookie, dusted with powdered sugar. None of the British morbidity can be found here, none of the British sense of irony. The sand is white, the skies are blue, and the American weltanschauung consists of bold, bright colours.  
  
Last night I slept with a man. I wore the perfume you distilled from your roses and let him have me. It's been a while, and when I closed my eyes I wanted to see your face. Then it was me and the scent of roses, a faceless man in a faceless bed and a very existent cock. I missed sex. I missed you more. I hope you are jealous now, sickened at this entry. I hope you wish to kill me and my nameless lover. He was someone I chose on the beach, merely for being so different than you. Beautiful and sun-tanned, with the wind rustling his blond locks. Don't ask me for his name. I don't remember it.  
  
I am lying in this defiled bed now, with my defiled body, wondering at what I've become. How far do you want me to go in order to come back to you? I've been to the Orient. Now I'm in America, slowly shedding my skin of civilized Britishness. I am becoming an animal at your command. I am drowning at your command. I'll ride into the deep river if you ask me to, although I'm no longer a maid. Oh, I know you and your evil schemes. You want me to live for me, but all I want is to die for you. Can't you see that is all I'm fit for?  
  
I remember you ranting several months ago about me cutting my hair. I wish I still had it on my head to cut. I wish I still had it to entwine another secret between my curls and forgot any of it ever happened. I remember the aftermath of the last battle. Remember waiting for a certain sense of absolution...of accomplishment. Which never came. I am waiting for it now. I know it won't come. Last night I slept in the arms of this nameless, faceless stranger, and I knew that even if it was you inside me, I wouldn't have felt complete. The realization was devastating, and I cried when I came.  
  
Is that my catharsis?  
  
What is your catharsis?  
  
How is Crookshanks?  
  
I love you still.  
Hermione.  
  
  


~*~

  
  
30 May  
Oxfordshire  
  
I find I have no adequate salutation for this letter, a reply to yours of 2 April. I should write, "Dear Hermione." I cannot. I could write "My Dear Miss Granger," but since I have released you to the world, you are not mine.  
  
I suppose you want me to approve of your nameless, faceless, disaffected assignation with your tanned, blond and muscular American cock.  
  
I suppose I should approve, seeing how you are doing as I bade you.  
  
Your damnable Kneazle plagues me night and day. I well understand why Minerva was so eager to rid herself of his questionable company. His only contribution to this household is to rid the garden of rodents, for which I suppose I should thank him. On the other hand, his dining table of choice is the floor next to the bed, where I put my feet each morning.  
  
You ask what is my catharsis. I suppose I should tell you that it is to hear your stories of the roads you travel, your white sands, your brief studies in Paris, your foul Asian rivers, your childishly happy American viewpoint, your shorn locks and my perfume as an agent in your anonymous sexual encounters. In truth it is none of these things. I cannot imagine what will shrive what small soul I have discovered within myself, unless it is you.  
  
It has taken me almost two months to write this much. I am locked within my British morbidity, but even so -- I will never agree that it is your prerogative to die for me.  
  
As you are not mine, I suppose I am not yours.  
Severus Snape  
  
  


~*~

  
  
5 June  
  
My love,  
  
You evil, evil man. Don't you know that even when I'm with others I am always, hopelessly, helplessly yours? I am a candle nursed inside a magnolia's leaf, sent over the bayou's golden-brown water, to carry your wishes into the Gulf of Mexico. I am your bluish white hands, sunk to the armpits in the bayou's tannin, clear-tea depths which you might sip in your British morbidity. I cry with exultation as I see and I feel and I breathe and I fuck because you told me to.  
  
Yes, I know there is no absolution waiting for me here, but wasn't it Nathaniel Hawthorne, an American, who said, long before Freud, that one must reach the bottom before one can soar?  
  
It is going to be a rough time, Snape, and I'm afraid. Afraid of me. The bottom is tempting, and whether I am too weak to pull back or too anxious to see what's waiting for me there, I believe I'm going to find out how deep is the abyss in my soul. Am I as thorough in my self-destruction as I have been in my studies? I think that perhaps I may be. Maybe when I'm done being bad, I can be good. India was for me to glue the broken pieces together . Now that I once more resemble a human soul, I think I can fracture and shatter me all over again. I need to know how I will come out without you or the knowledge of you being nearby to put me together again. I must learn new occupations other than to die for you, as it doesn't seem to do anymore. I need to live for me, only I don't know how. I'd ask you to teach me how, only I have this slight suspicion you'd decline my request.  
  
I miss you hysterically. It's almost a year now and I still miss you. I cannot afford to miss you after so long, Snape. It is a privilege I have no coin with which to pay, aside from my heart's blood.  
  
Sleeping with that stranger seemed like the right thing to do at the time, although I often wonder what is it that prevents me from moving onward. Perhaps something inside me is broken and I don't even know who or what I miss. My grasp of reality is slowly loosening and even what was reality slowly becomes faded and mumbled â€" like standing, soapy water. I need you to save me, Snape. I need you to save me from my foolish future escapades. Nevertheless, I know it wouldn't be right. I know that even when I let you save me it wasn't right, because I have been giving up my own ability to save myself.  
  
I wish I knew a healthy way to love you. Without having either of us to calibrate the other. The Western love archetype is false. It commands us to be the broken half of a whole. I wish I knew a way to be whole beside you. I don't. I must learn. I must â€" I suppose â€" breathe the mingled scent of lemon and musk pouring from the magnolias and not think of you.  
  
I'm glad to hear you and Crook are enjoying each other's company. Talk to him â€" and don't mind his answers. He can be foul indeed, but so are you, my love.  
  
I dream of you from time to time, and while none of the dreams do I remember in great detail, I do remember seeing you washed in the lucid light of morning, barefoot on the dewy grass. Dreaming of you, I wake up with a sense of restfulness.  
  
Wherever I go, Snape, you are my one true north.  
  
I won't die for you, and I won't live for you, either. I'll breathe the heavy, perfumed air of the bayou as if I have no care in this world. But in the end, Snape, I'll come back for you. Remember what you promised me.  
  
Mine,  
Hermione.  
  
  


~*~

  
  
01 January  
Oxfordshire  
  
I opened with much pleasure your Christmas gift, the Collected Works of Edgar Allan Poe. I would refer you most earnestly to the stories, "The Tell-Tale Heart" and "The Cask of Amontillado" and "The Purloined Letter" if you have not already devoured them, voracious reader that you have always been.  
  
Did my gift to you arrive, as well? It took two weeks to properly compound an adequate sun-screen lotion for your south-of-the-equator travels to Peru, since it must all be done without magic. I have been reading about altitude sickness; Nazca is at a tremendous elevation. Please use precautions; there are charms to help the sick breathe; you may find them helpful so high in the mountains. I greatly desire to hear more of the lessons you learned from the witches in Brazil and Argentina, and what you taught them of potions brewing and Flitwick's charm methods.  
  
Did you see the Amazon? I must know. Is it truly the muscular and brown river I think it must be? How did it compare to the Ganges? The Jordan?  
  
You may be pleased to know I have finally electrified the cottage and installed a Muggle cookstove in the kitchen. Its operation is not difficult, but surely time-consuming. I find the accurate regulation of the temperature for brewing very helpful. Adequate light for reading was becoming a must; incandescent lights give a warmer glow than does a wand, and I found oil lamps and candles too smoky and malodorous, not to mention dangerous, with your Kneazle roaming everywhere, waving his tail near open flames. I required a way to heat water as well; cold baths were not pleasant.  
  
I have a job at long last; I have graduated to Muggle from Squib. The villagers have decided that I am the local "wise man" in the way that Angharad was once their wise woman. Several of them remember me from my time as her apprentice. They come and buy my herbs and simple remedies for coughs or sneezes; spices; vegetables; herbal distillations. Your black rose fragrance pays for the electricity. I have a Muggle bank account, as well. It would not do to transact such business through Gringotts, though I keep my savings in the goblin bank. My current occupation does not bring me as much income as did teaching at Hogwarts, but I require very little in the way of money. So much of what the villagers bring to pay for their purchases is very practical: meat, such vegetables as I do not grow, fish for your damned familiar, plants for the garden, their strong arms when I require assistance with household maintenance such as mending the stone walls or the roof.  
  
The augurey comes and goes; this is the third year since the winter you and I lived here together that she has built her nest on the roof; but she does not cry before the rains, not since she cried for you. Each year a male joins her briefly; there are always two eggs and two chicks. They make a mess of the chimney and roof tiles. I collect her feathers from the empty nest each autumn; they fetch a good sum from Ollivander as wand cores for compact collapsible wands, which grow more popular each year, it seems. To me, a telescoping wand made of metal and filled with the capricious feathers of your augurey is simply asking for troubled spells and charms, but who am I to judge?  
  
Minerva visits me often. Hogwarts belongs to her, now; did I remember to tell you? It took the Ministry fools this long to make her position permanent, with Professor Vector as her deputy headmistress. She brings me news of Potter and various Weasleys, and sometimes of you, though she gives me very hard looks, still, when I mention your name. She has not quite forgiven me, I think. Potter is nearly finished with his auror training, but I expect you know that, and both of the youngest Weasleys have been hired by the Ministry. It seems to run in that family. I always knew they were fools; yet, their intentions are noble. There may be hope for the Ministry yet.  
  
Write to me soon. No one else can convey sarcasm or knowledge, desperation or hope to me as you can.  
  
A Happy New Year to you,  
Severus Snape  
  
  


~*~

  
  
12 January  
Peru  
  
The Amazon is a strong, brown god. I often think it is the Amazon Eliot was talking about in his Dry Salvages. Perhaps, if the Indians are patient, the Americans young and the Jews ancient and crude, I might say that the Native Americans are everything that the fifteenth-century sailors expected them to be: their earth is a male entity and their rivers are masculine. They might as well wear their eyes on their chests with their myths and archetypes so different from ours. But then, people who are superstitious and biased are often exposed as short-sighted. One had best appear fully clothed at one's Auto da Fe ceremony in order to be burnt.  
  
I am still staying at the same Wizarding village I told you about in the eastern slopes of the Andes. The villagers and I hardly understand each other but they are fascinated with my wand and otherwise western methods of working magic. It seems that even the smallest child here is capable of some wandless magic, not to mention the elders. Seeing I have some practice applying wandless magic, I am more interested in their potions making. It is the village's priestess who took me under her wing, and while she isn't quite the Potions mistress, I daresay her education might be compared to that of a healer.  
  
The kids, who have hardly ever seen white people, are enthralled with my skin and hair. I am sleeping with a man whose name I can't quite pronounce, but it sounds like molten chocolate when I ask him to utter it. He, too, is fascinated with my whiteness. When we rest together on his plaited mattress of wide, dried leaves, I wonder at these people who welcome foreigners instead of rejecting them.  
  
Your Christmas gift to me arrived safely, and I'm grateful for your consideration. I will put it into good use come spring. It is constantly raining these last couple of months, and I have been told â€" with plenty of hand-waving â€" that the rain will continue on and off until mid March. It is with the rain falling over the cabin's low roof that I am writing to you. The scent of ozone is heady. It seems to pour from the forest and wrap the village like mist. I can detect it on my man's skin, the way your perfume clings to my shirts. The bottle you sent me two years ago is empty. I forgot to tell you. Please send me a new one if you can spare it from your stock.  
  
You asked me what did I learn here in America, and I have no doubt you expect me to give you a detailed list of the skills I've acquired. For several minutes, Snape, I intended to do just that. Then it occurred to me â€" oh, how clichÃ© â€" that the most important things I learned, the most important skills I have acquired, are not the brewing methods of certain potions and not the casting of certain spells.  
  
The eighteen months have been so hazy I can barely remember them. I have been so lost, Snape. I have been so tired. I remember days being dragged, floating, having no body, only the pain my body served to engulf. I would feel the air stagnating underneath my ribcage, and my heart beating wildly. Nothing more. Sometimes a sense of my body would return â€" of my head resting on cold flagstones. Of being cold. Missing you; missing me. And I would be afraid, though I would not think of it. Wouldn't want to think of it.  
  
Now, howeverâ€¦ I can simply lie here, with the sun glittering amongst the raindrops, and I amâ€¦ this is not acceptance, you see. There is no mental process involved in my sense of complacency. I don't feel whole. I don't tell myself that I have abandoned my search of mental wholeness as there's no such thing. But something in me is able to take pleasure in simply _being_ here. Something in me is able to absorb the scent of ozone and feel exultation and cry.  
  
You were right to assume I keep corresponding with Harry and Ron. Mainly with Harry, as Ron is hardly the type to invest time and effort in writing letters. Harry keeps asking about you, did you know that? He seems to take an interest in what happens to you. Yes, I can already hear your "The Boy Who Lived to Collect Stray Animals" speech. Please spare me this one.  
  
It is about bloody time you introduced the cottage to the twenty first century. The word "Muggle" does sting, now doesn't it? Nevertheless, I hope you do realize that no matter what you do, you would always be able to do magic. I believe that if you gave it a moment's thought, you'd realize that in a way, many wizards are cable of nothing more than some pitiable incantations. They're brandishing their wands, drawing whatever magic they are able to draw, manipulating it in the best way they know and using it for their own selfish purposes. You, however, are a true magician. When you call, the earth moves under your feet, and your willpower is enough to move mountains. You can brew me a sun-screen lotion without using a wand and live as a Muggle even though you were born a wizard. You spied after Voldemort for years and outlived him, and saved me so I could save myself.  
  
I can imagine your expression when reading this. Sulk all you want. I know my sentimentality intimidates you. It no longer intimidates me. I am done being scared of myself.  
  
Please give Professor McGonagall my love and pet Crookshanks for me.  
  
I love you dearly,  
Hermione.  
  
  


~*~

  
  
  
13 June  
Oxfordshire  
  
Where are you? I will send the little rented owl away with this letter, knowing it will return unopened, as have all my letters this past month. Still, it is my message in a bottle; the vain hope that one perfect cast upon the vast ocean will somehow reach you, the one person in six billion in whom I have the least interest. Well, perhaps there are three people in six billion -- Minerva, Flitwick, and you. Lucius has never turned up, though I had expected he would.  
  
I can only conclude that you have at last met someone to complete you, to fill that void, and therefore I am no longer of use. Pardon my wallowing in self-pity; the level in the Jameson's is shamefully low, but I believe I am completely entitled. Your melted-chocolate Peruvian wizard, perhaps, has soothed your soul.  
  
You were right in your assessment of Potter -- he indeed has collected me, one of his strays. I grow weary of his weekly visits. He drinks too much of my whiskey and brings me brandy as a poor substitute. He has set me a task of brewing or at least researching a new potion that is intended to create "a bubble of peace" around a person, a bubble that negative energy cannot penetrate. It is not a shield, as those must be cast by strong magic; but it is intended to protect the mind of the drinker. It is destined for another stray of his, some haunted and haunting blue-eyed denizen of St. Mungo's who apparently may never leave the closed ward without the negative energy outside St. Mungo's rendering her catatonic. I ponder this potion frequently; I may require assistance to brew it, and Potter naturally has volunteered. I will permit him only if there becomes a magical aspect to the solution, which as you know, Muggle that I am, I cannot supply. It seems this inmate has charmed him; he speaks of her often.  
  
Perhaps you are hurt somewhere, lying poisoned from some foul New World potion.  
  
I have been waiting for the black rose to blossom again in order to distill more of your fragrance, but it sulks this year, expending energy in climbing to the roof of the cottage. Perhaps the upper limbs are receiving too much sun, and that is affecting its blossoming. I will consider pruning it, but unless I prune the truly old branches, there is a screaming in my mind that I cannot bear. There is more to the black rose than its strange fragrance and its love for the dim places. An odd sort of blood pulses in its stems, which is, I suppose, why it reminds me so much of you. Cut you, and you bleed. I cannot bear to clip the young branches; the welling of its dark sap is too much to observe.  
  
If I thought you might actually open _this_ letter, I might beg your indulgence in a reply, no matter how curt or hurtful. Send me a detailed list of the men you have fucked, their length and girth specifics, and how many times they made you come. I would surely curse you beyond the capabilities of my speech, were you to do so. Yet I would rejoice in the reply.  
  
You told me once that I am a true magician. You told me once that I am your true north. The only truth I know about myself is this: I am a man; a man only, yet I want these other things to be true as well. I would move myself, the mountain, to set myself in your path. I long for you to climb me, to set your ice axe in me, to melt the glacier of my soul.  
  
If I thought you might actually open _this_ letter, I would not dare to ask the question that has been in my mind for months. But since I know that this letter will return like a boomerang that found no target, I will ask it here. The message for my bottle.  
  
Is it time?  
  
Yours alone,  
Severus Snape


	38. Epilogue

_love is more thicker than forget  
more thinner than recall  
more seldom than a wave is wet  
more frequent than to fail  
  
it is most mad and moonly  
and less it shall unbe  
than all the sea which only  
is deeper than the sea  
  
love is less always than to win  
less never than alive  
less bigger than the least begin  
less littler than forgive  
  
it is most sane and sunly  
and more it cannot die  
than all the sky which only  
is higher than the sky_

  
\-- "love is more thicker than forget"  
\-- e.e.cummings

It was Midsummer Eve. Much of the day Snape had simply puttered about, gathering his incense for the night's celebration at Angharad's Circle. Though he had been the only one to perform the rites for more than three years, he still thought of the Circle as belonging to Angharad. The cottage and garden finally felt more like they belonged to him, but the more spiritual aspects of the Circle were still hers. Whenever he performed a rite, he imagined her at his side, or across the altar from him.

And, always, he imagined Hermione there as well. A new Hermione, one whose hair did not reach the small of her back. He imagined her with a frizzy brown aureole, rather like a dandelion, though he knew it was three years since she had shaved her head, and it was likely longer than in his imagination.

It was nearly six weeks since he had heard from her. A week ago he had finally broken down and asked Potter, on one of his pestilential weekly visits, if he'd heard from her. Potter had not, but didn't seem the least disturbed. Potter was almost blissfully happy, in fact. The potion Snape had been brewing for the past month was beginning to have the desired effects upon the patient, who Potter called "Chloe," though there was still much work to be done. Something was still not balanced in the combination of dragonsbane, digitalis, bluebell extract, and St. John's Wort. Or perhaps it was the orris root Snape had put in to mask the stench of the dragons bane. According to Potter, Chloe would abide any stench, no matter how vile, if she could simply see the sky without a roof over it, for a day spent outside St. Mungo's, even if she had to return each night to sleep there when the potion wore off. Snape's goal was to make the potion more permanent, or at the very least, a single dose per day.

It was good to have the distraction of the potion. It kept his mind from completely derailing in his worry over Hermione's continued silence.

And now there was the Midsummer ritual, a more elaborate ritual than his usual salutes to the dawn and the dusk at the different moon phases. This was the only ritual that involved burning oak in the Needfire, and he had carefully chosen a small branch from a large oak along the lane to the village, one free of mistletoe. The incense was particular and specific, and consisted of a long list of plants: birch bark, cardamom seeds, blossoms of St. John's wort, white lilies, sweet meadow rue, rose (for which Snape had plucked a very few petals from the single black rose that had bloomed so far this year), sedum, fragrant verbena and clover.

A short time before sunset, he bathed in the oak water and dressed himself in his druid clothing. The feathered cloak was too warm, but he pulled it around himself anyway and wandered slowly to Angharad's Circle. He had fasted for only a day prior to this ritual; Hermione had been right, years ago, to proclaim that the long fasts did nothing for him except to weaken him and make him susceptible to hallucinations out of hunger.

He faced west and saluted the sun. "Bel, sweet rest."

He faced east and greeted the moon. "Arianrhod, welcome."

He turned back to the altar and lifted his basket.

He smiled slightly to himself as he placed the incense, plant by plant, on the altar. Among the long list, four had special significance, and as he placed each, he spoke a beloved name.

Cardamom seeds. "Conscience Minerva."

A white stargazer lily shamelessly filched at dawn from a neighbor's garden, while the sky was still dim, for his first Gryffindor love. "Lily." And now he could add her last name without feeling anger or the sharp stab of jealousy: "Lily Potter."

The oak, for his mentor. "Angharad, dear one."

And last, but certainly not least, black rose petals, for his Gryffindor love. "Hermione, my heart's one love."

He carefully sprinkled the remaining plants over the altar, crushing the verbena and clover in his fingers to release their fragrance.

"I see that you've forgotten the sedum," said a voice behind him. "But that's all right; Mrs Cates down the lane has some in her stone wall, and I managed to pluck a bit on my way from the village. I'll put it in, shall I? How appropriate, Snape -- sedum, also called stonecrop, the plant that grows where others cannot. A plant that looks like it belongs in the desert, yet it grows here in our cool, wet England, among our pale stones."

From the first spoken syllables, Snape's eyes had closed. That voice, the one he had thought never to hear again. Husky, sweet, soft, and strangely new. Dream? He did not dare to open his eyes.

"I was sure I would find you here, today of all days," she continued. He could hear her drawing closer, the sound of cloth brushing over the grass. Will you be barefoot, now, you who could not bear the earth to touch you?

When her small, warm hand touched his waist and trailed along the small of his back as she walked around the altar, Snape began to tremble.

"Sedum, for Snape, my love."

His eyes opened slowly, in time to see her placing the fleshy leaves and purplish blossom stem of the sedum on the altar. He heard someone gasping harshly, almost a sob torn from a sore throat, and realized it was himself. Her hair was not the dandelion aureole of his imaginings; it was just above shoulder length, and wildly curling. She was not dressed in her druid clothing, and so he knew she had not been to the cottage, for her white robe and cloak hung in his armoire, at the back behind his wizard robes, the ones he never wore any more. She was wearing a yellow singlet, tucked into loose-fitting, natural linen trousers. The flaring hem of the trousers brushed the grass and was what he had heard as she approached. Her feet were bare. She wore a necklace, made of small, wooden beads, what appeared to be hard seeds of some sort, with oddly silvery stones interspersed. It was snug about her neck, resting on the knobs of her collarbones in the hollow of her throat.

As she straightened, she lifted her sickle from her belt. "In Peru, the midsummer is celebrated in January, on Nazca plain in a series of dances. Everyone in the town dances, young and old, fat and thin, happy and not. I think I prefer the solitude of this ritual of ours, Snape."

Snape swallowed, unable to look away from her eyes, unable to speak. A small smile curved her lips.

"I'll start, shall I?" she queried. "But I think we should both supply the blood this time." She set the sickle to the pad of her thumb. Even in the sunset light Snape could see the tracery of scars, the map of Hermione's world carved into the skin of her forearms, but the scars were white and old. "East, into the first of the Night." A drop of blood fell into the incense on the altar.

Snape, still trembling, fumbled with his own sickle, and had to calm himself before he was able to nick his skin. "West, into the last of the Light." And at last he was able to look away from her, and watch the droplet of his blood fall to land next to hers.

Hermione spoke again. "South, into the warm Spark." Another drop.

Snape completed the words. "North, into the chill Dark." And the last.

"Call it," she whispered to him, putting her blade away.

"Help me," he whispered back, holding out his arm. She took his hand and coiled herself inside his arm, pulling it around herself, pressing her back to his belly. "Goddess," he murmured into her hair.

"Hardly that," she responded, lifting her free arm, and together they called down the Needfire, and the Circle woke around them.

To Snape, falling to his knees and gripping her hips to turn her to face him, it seemed as if the Circle spun slowly, lazily, without haste, without urgency. He could smell the verbena and clover and black rose as their fragrance wafted upward. Her hands moved to rest on his shoulders, at first, then to thread through his hair to brush it back from his face, and finally to cradle his jaw and tilt his face up. Her fingertips traced the fine dark arch of his brows.

"Your eyes," she said to him. "They're calmer. Quieter."

Wordlessly he took hold of her right hand and flattened the palm against his chest, over his heart. From her small smile, he knew she could feel his heart's wild pounding. She sank to her knees in front of him, still holding him. Snape knew she could feel him trembling, but he could not make himself still.

"There was that question," he said, finally. Hermione's eyes lowered; he thought he could feel them burning at the hollow of his throat, and a moment later her mouth burned there instead, soft, moist, hot.

"Do we need to ask it?" she queried, nuzzling her way up his neck. "I'm here, you're here."

"I suppose we don't," he murmured. Somehow his fingers had moved into the tangle of her hair; he pressed his lips to her right temple. But that wasn't enough; not when he had dreamed of her mouth for more than three years.

"Right, then," she mumbled. Her fingers moved to the rope that belted his robe. Her fingers untied the knots. Almost ceremonially she set the belt aside, and met his gaze. Snape looked only into those brimming brown eyes; his fingers found the knot of the drawstring -- a proper, druid's knot -- that cinched her trousers snugly to her waist. She rose a moment so that he could tug the trousers and practical cotton pants down around her ankles, then she stepped out of them and knelt again.

Hermione's hands, small, square, practical, and so warm that he thought he might be scorched by them, set free the feathered cloak and allowed it to wander the Circle as it would. Then they parted his robe. "Shall I?" she asked, her fingers moving to the long winding of his loincloth.

"Yes, please," he said, between teeth gritted in control. He waited impatiently as she slowly unwound the loincloth and folded it precisely. Her warm hands cupped his erection, stroking gently, and he had to bite his lip. He was shaken; he was elated. He was going to explode like a teenager if she kept touching him like that.

"Help me," she said to him now, still holding his eyes.

"Merlin," he whispered, his hands reaching for the hem of her yellow singlet and lifting it over her head, finding her breasts constrained by a strapless bandeau. When the singlet was set aside, his hands returned to caress the curve of her buttocks, then to slide upward over her ribs and tug the bandeau away, leaving her naked in his arms. She squirmed closer still, and hurriedly pushed his robe aside, before he lay back and drew her down upon him. The soft curls of her hair brushed his cheeks and throat; he could feel her legs stretch alongside his own, her bare toes curling against his shins. The necklace swung forward and he could smell the scent of nutmeg in what he had taken for wooden beads. The seeds had been polished by their long contact with her tanned, dewy skin. She looked down at him, still searching his eyes in the last of the rosy sunset light. And finally he could bear it no longer, and rolled her over in the longish grass of the Circle, the small stars of lawn daisies framing her face. He settled his lean hips between her thighs -- and surely, in the years of her wandering, she had grown more curvy -- the cup of her navel was deeper, her muscles more toned, yet not so taut as when she had been sixteen and ready to fight the last evil of their world. Womanly, now, and serene with it.

He moved to slide inside her, but something made him halt, poised at her entrance, trembling. He felt her hands slide to his hips and clutch at him. Her back arched and her eyes darkened, and then her hands moved to link behind his neck and pull his head down at last, to that sweet, parted mouth.

"Celebrate," she whispered to him. "Celebrate, Snape."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ~fin~  
> Israel  
> &  
> Washington, USA  
> 23:48 16 August, 2004


End file.
